“Sealand forgets her friends
She’ll not leave them again
Mother, sister and home
These arms fail you so”
Sealand – OMD – “Architecture and Morality” – 1981
This place has quite a history.
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belgië through the eyes of andy townend
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A reciprocal visit! These shots work really well in monochrome, they bring out the starkness of the stories behind the bricks and in the graffiti. The angle of the last shot is satisfyingly unsettling!
Thank you, the place is very sad, the story tragic, the building in the first shot is the school which for me made it even more unsettling…
Sorry, this will be a useless comment, but those photos are stunning. I adore abandoned buildings, so this resonates with me perfectly.
Thank you, I have become addicted to this place and then I remembered the old OMD song which went off like a bomb in my head, Doel is (was) a polder town behind a seawall near Antwerp, the last few residents are fighting a battle with the port and government to save the town, a powerful story and this post just clicked for me, pictures and music just all came together, after all the time I spent in Beograd I was shocked to find this here…
Exactly my thoughts, I wouldn’t expect this in Belgium, sights like these are usually reserved for the poorer parts of Europe, especially post-communist countries, I’d hazard to say. There’s some rugged beauty in it though.
Yes, it is unexpected and its location is weird, behind a huge sea wall and surrounded by the container port and a nuclear power station, and a handful of people raising a collective finger to the forces of commerce and government, its hard not to be moved by it, I am glad you liked it…
I liked it too : -) …and still rate Architecture and Morality as one of my favourite albums, too. I’m mostly a blue-skies-and-sunshine kind of guy, but am strangely drawn to the melancholy of deserted buildings, washed up on the shores of time. Thank you for sharing.
Thank you, this is a place frozen in time, for now at least…
Fantastic photos. Those windows in the second shot are such a good find, and you’ve captured them so each individual pane looks like a little work of art… I love the reflection in the broken window in particular, and how the shattered glass breaks up the electric cables… stunning.
Thank you! In this particular location there is something on very street corner…the atmosphere seeps into your bones…
It feels odd that I like a photo that shows such deformation of a building but I do. A picture or story told in each brick and pane of glass be it some are broken. Poignant clip too x
Thank you, there are layers of meaning in this post, some of them very deep down…x
i can imagine x
I love architecture photographs in black and white. All these photos are so striking!
Thank you!
Wow, Doel in black and white – very original! Beautiful pics!
Thank you, it is a very moving place, I am not done with it yet….