New Year / Old Year: Remains of an abandoned industrial estate

Wandering the remains of an abandoned industrial estate in search of graffiti art.

The period between Christmas and New Year is always ambiguous. Is it a bright new year (for the post-winter solstice pagans) or the dying embers of an old one (for the Gregorians)? Is it religious or secular? Holiday or working?

The Glasgow Chronicler and I had some excess Christmas sludge to walk off and decided to go in search of an abandoned industrial estate, reportedly taken over by graffiti artists to practice their skills and express their art in relative peace. The tip was very hush hush, to keep the location secret, but what we found turned out to be quite different. We were too late for the graffiti galleries as, seven or eight months ago, the warehouses and buildings of the industrial estate were levelled bar one or two standing survivors.

Twisted metal

What remained was still atmospheric and worth exploring with its abandoned service roads, mounds of earth and debris, and piles of twisted metal and bricks. There was pretty much everything lying around: mounds of rotting Old Firm paraphernalia; phones, bikes, beds, toys, flippers, even a boat adrift on a sea of debris and bricks.

There were the cries of birds overhead, the tumble of an underground river and the rumble of passing trains silhouetted against the weak winter sun shafting through the clouds. Planes glinted in the sky. The last working warehouse of the estate looked pristine and neat set amongst the sea of industrial remains.

Entrance to a portal?

Last of the graffiti pieces

Adrift on a sea of debris

Last of the estate’s buildings

Winter sun over abandoned landscape

Walking down a road

Luckily a record of the graffiti art has been preserved by the West Coast Walls blog that captured a snapshot of a place about to disappear (See links below). The occupants of the local houses will probably be quite relieved when this site is eventually developed and replaces their current view of an expansive rubbish tip!

West Coast Walls: Abandoned Industrial estate and graffiti: Parts one, two, three and four.