The junction of Steep Street and Trenchard Street
This remarkable photograph from 1866 captures the junction of Steep Street and Trenchard Street in Bristol, a tangle of crooked buildings, cobbled slopes, and narrow footpaths that perfectly evoke the texture of Victorian city life. With signs for R. Holloway – Dealer in Marine Stores and Hair Cut, the image reveals not just architecture, but the everyday rhythms of a working-class neighbourhood.
Bristol, already a historic port by this time, was undergoing rapid transformation, shaped by trade, migration, and industrial growth. Streets like Steep Street — now long vanished or renamed — were filled with sailors, traders, shopkeepers, and families crammed into ancient timbered houses clinging to the hillside.
This photo captures the poetry of place: uneven rooftops, worn doorsteps, crooked shop signs — the raw and unsanitised heart of a city still in flux.
🏘️ Do you have vintage photos of city streets, old shops or forgotten corners of your town? Share them on Oldpik.com and help preserve the living memory of our urban past.
Bristol, already a historic port by this time, was undergoing rapid transformation, shaped by trade, migration, and industrial growth. Streets like Steep Street — now long vanished or renamed — were filled with sailors, traders, shopkeepers, and families crammed into ancient timbered houses clinging to the hillside.
This photo captures the poetry of place: uneven rooftops, worn doorsteps, crooked shop signs — the raw and unsanitised heart of a city still in flux.
🏘️ Do you have vintage photos of city streets, old shops or forgotten corners of your town? Share them on Oldpik.com and help preserve the living memory of our urban past.
Contributed by OldPik on January 7, 2024
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