A Revolutionary Bridge

I decide against visiting any of the ten museums in and around Ironbridge, opting instead to cycle through the beautiful Ironbridge Gorge from Jackfield to Ironbridge following instructions lifted from the internet.

As with most instructions there are a few gaps that could well do with a bit of padding out. But never-the less, I make it to Ironbridge without getting lost more than two or three times, having a nice chat with a lady from a walking group along the way. She tells me she had the chance to become a Ten Pound Pom when she was sixteen and wishes she had. Water under the (Iron)bridge eh?

I have a very delicious pastie from a shop opposite the famous bridge and sit nearby contemplating the fact that the decorative quality of a structure was once important even when working with a 'new' material. I fear that art is lost in the structures of our present day. Or should I say scale and proportion seems lost? For weird and arty structures have appeared in recent years but will they stand the test of time? On the other hand, you couldn't get anything more weird or arty than Gaudi's famous cathedral in Barcelona, now could you?

I walk over the bridge, now only open to foot traffic, and cycle through the trees beside the river back to Jackfield.

Having rejected the idea of museum visiting, I decide, after all, to visit the Jackfield Tile Museum. This area is apparently not just famous as the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution, but has jolly good pottery clay (or is it china clay) as well. And Jackfield was once the hub of the world's tile industry.

The museum is set up in the old offices, hallways, showrooms and artist studio of Maw & Co., known throughout the world for the quality and decorative excellence of their many different tiles. Designers had their own particular style and became known for their distinctive work.

A fun part of the museum are the rooms recreating a place where tiles were used extensively, such as an old-fashioned butcher shop, a pub and the curved wall of a tube station with 'COVENT GARDEN' written in the tile work.

The factory today still churns out quality tiles for the Craven Dunnill Company and you can watch a tile painter hand painting the tiles. He looks very serene and his brush strokes confident, obviously not at all put off by people watching him work.

But I've lingered long enough in Ironbridge so it's off Builth Wells in the middle of Wales where I have booked a B&B at a farm for the night.

My hostess is quite a friendly soul, bustling and efficient. She instructs me to remove my shoes as she doesn't allow shoes in the house! What? Oh, right-ho! (Is this a Welsh thing?) She provides some rather hideous towelling scuffs for those who require them.

Now I don't know how you feel about these sort of things, but I for one feel somewhat diminished in my socks. At a social disadvantage you might say, and even more so in towelling scuffs! There's a certain primitive flair to bare feet, but that requires a particular style of clothing and a few bits of jangling gypsy jewellery, all of which are noticeably absent from my wardrobe.

Just to emphasise my point, can you imagine the Queen in her stockings? Or Henry VIII in his socks? There's a distinct loss of authority when one is in one's socks.

And so as I am sneaking towards my boudoir, the only suitable place for socks, I am accosted by an old fossil (he's has taken up the offer of towelling scuffs) who wishes to tell me of all the places he's lived and worked is this great wide world. And being in a socially diminished, besocked condition, I have no power to resist, and so spent a less than lively half hour with this crashing old bore reliving his glory days.

I eventually make good my escape and ascend to my room, incredulous that one could invite herds of people to one's home as paying guests, then make them take of their shoes at the door. Why not go for more serviceable floor coverings one wonders?