Ladysmith Road Celebrates!

​A small group of Ladysmith Road residents have come together to think how they can encourage all of their neighbours to come join them in a street celebration.

They have a plan!!

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(All events are FREE to you but, in usual Squilometre style we may ask you to pop something in the hat to allow the next street project to happen.  That's how the Ladysmith project was funded.  What goes around a Squilometre comes right on around again!)
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 The Pod kicked off by holding two festive events for their neighbours

Saturday 4th December 2021 -  Lantern making with rainbows and hailstones but wonderful lanterns were made

Wednesday 15th December 2021 - Lantern parade with carols - around 50 local people came to join us for a wonderful evening with carols, mulled wine and mince pies - pure magic!

Coming next!
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Ladysmith Rocks! 50s/60s Rock n Roll Social - Sunday 23rd January 2022
Please watch for further announcements about this - may need to be postponed due to Covid

Please sign up here ->

And let us know how many will be in your party

The Pod are planning the finale event the weekend after the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee to ensure families are back from any breaks they might take - Sunday 12th June 2022 - hold the date!  Everyone still seems to favour the idea of a street party with long tables, bring your own food type of event with music and dancing.

In the meantime

They'll continue to visit some of our older residents in their own homes to hear their Ladysmith memories.  ​​

And

They've got a series of Springtime street happenings on the bubble too - still plenty of room for your ideas though.  Why not get in touch - email:  jojo@heavitreesquilometre.org  or use the contact form below.

One Springtime idea is to recreate this photo outside of No. 1 Ladysmith Road and to unveil a planter decorated with Ladysmith-inspired tiles - in memory of the Sampson Brick and Tile works.

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Some Ladysmith Road (and environs) celebrations from the past

Images kindly provided by former Ladysmith resident - Robert Squire

1906 map showing the earliest development at the top of Ladysmith Road. From https://maps.nls.uk/

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There's lots and lots of fascinating Ladysmith Road heritage to explore to help build a really inclusive, relevant and fun project, culminating in a lovely street celebration ...

and oodles of learning potential too!



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A decorative brick from Candy & Co Newton Abbot made from Bovey basin ball clay - from Park Road, Exeter

The story in brick!
A visual survey of the street and some fascinating discussion on the Exeter Memories and Brick of the Day facebook pages threw light on the interesting occurrence of pale building bricks along Ladysmith Road.  We knew of the Brick and Tile works (see map above) owned by Victorian entrepreneur and philanthropist, John Sampson but the locally sourced clay is red.  So the sudden inclusion of the pale bricks in the Edwardian period is an enigma.

However, the great online hive mind gradually pieced together that the arrival of the railway in Exeter would have made it far easier to transport the pale decorative bricks from Candy & Co in Newton Abbot into the City.  The building of the Exmouth Junction in 1908 would have made it easier still to reach the Polsloe area.
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One of the other things we found intriguing was the variety of differing building styles.  At first glance the street seems to be fairly uniform but actually there are groups of houses with distinctive styles of windows and brick patterning.  This became a little clearer when someone pointed out that the land may be been bought by one developer and then sold in blocks to different builders who would have made their own choices about style and materials.  So, even though the development of the whole street would have happened broadly within the same period, there may have been many different builders involved.  Fascinating bit of insight into Edwardian street planning!
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