Wings Appeal

The Royal Air Forces Association’s ‘Wings Appeal’ has been raising money to support Air Force members and their families since 1951 (RAFA). This bed of flowers in the pattern of the Air Force’s red, white, and blue roundel (the reverse of the French roundel) is at the start of the Antiville Road in Larne.

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Copyright © 2018 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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Le Coq Sportif

Glentoran FC’s emblem features a cock (similar to the rooster on Le Coq Sportif, which made the team’s strip from 1996-1999) and its slogan is “le jeu avant tout” (“the game before/above all). The sources of the French influence is unknown. In the mural above, from outside the Oval, he gives “East Belfast” the boot.

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Copyright © 2018 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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To Be Continued

Castlebrooke Investment’s Tribeca Belfast team have revealed(!) dates for a new plan and public consultation on their redevelopment project in the “triangle beside the cathedral”/North East Quarter/Royal Exchange. Here is Save the Cathedral Quarter’s description of the problems with the previous plan. In response to feedback, it seems the new plan will reduce the tower from 27 to 10 storeys and retain a redeveloped North Street arcade, among other changes (BelTel).

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Copyright © 2018 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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Like The Souk In An Hibernian Casablanca

Here are two more images of the new mural of the old Smithfield Market in Gresham Street by KVLR and JMK. According to the Glenravel booklet on the market, its creation goes back to about 1770. The title of the post is how the market was described in when a cover was added in the late 1800s (CultureNI); the booklet contains a directory from 1880 that includes tinsmiths, a basket maker, a cooper, and a hackler (a flax-comber).

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Copyright © 2018 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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Old Smithfield

Here are two images – one close-up, one wide shot – of the new mural in Gresham Street by KVLR and JMK of the old Smithfield Market. The market was fire-bombed in 1974 (gallery of 10 images at the Tele), quickly rebuilt with wood, and replaced permanently in 1986.

See also Like The Souk In An Hibernian Casablanca.

For images of the existing market, and paintings inside it of the old market, see Smithfield Market and My Old Toy Box.

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Copyright © 2018 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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Over The Bridge

The large mural of H&W shipyard workers at the turn of the century has been restored by Dee Craig (Fb). The mural is on the footbridge linking Dee Street and Queen’s Island. Inspired by paintings of William Conor such as Shipyard Workers Crossing Queen’s Bridge and Over The Bridge. For images of the previous version, see Titanic Workers.

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Copyright © 2018 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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Ulster’s Present Defenders

This mural forms a pair with Ulster’s Past Defenders in the middle of Newtownards Road’s ‘Freedom Corner’. The present defenders are the UDA/UFF; the past defenders were the UDR, and before them, the B Specials, (and before them, Cuchulainn – 2005 and 1992). Both pieces were repainted in 2016 after the previous murals disintegrated (see Freedom Corner for possible causes).

“The UDA was formed in 1971 as an umbrella for loyalist vigilante groups being formed. There role to defend protestant community from IRA violence. They remain today. The UFF was formed in 1973 as military group for the UDA to defend protestants from acts of Irish Republican violence over 30 yrs of conflict.”

From left to right: For Freedom Alone | As Long As 100 Of Us Remain Alive | Loyalist East Belfast | The Strangest Victory In All History | Ulster’s Past Defenders | Nationality is included in Loyalist East Belfast | Ulster’s Present Defenders | Freedom Corner

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Copyright © 2018 Extramural Activity
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