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Post by cfmrc on Dec 3, 2023 12:06:11 GMT
I will soon be making the escape stairs for the York Road tube station model. This picture shows the original ventilation shaft at the Caledonian Road.  Does anyone know what colour these would have been in the 1920s? Tim |
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Post by burkitt on Dec 3, 2023 22:55:03 GMT
Unfortunately I don't know of any reference to the original paint colour of the spiral stair vent ducts in either sources from the time of construction, or the usual books like Rails Through the Clay, Tiles of the Unexpected, and The Underground Stations of Leslie Green. The spiral stairs are comparatively rarely photographed, and early photos are of course all black and white, so that doesn't really help either.
That leaves us with looking at the actual stations, which is flawed in that I expect every one has been repainted at least once in the nearly 120 years since they opened.
The most common colour today is a pale cream, so if there's any continuity at all, that seems the most likely approximation of the original. For examples, here are a few links: Covent Garden link
Aldwych link linkGoodge Street and Belsize Park linkHyde Park Corner link
Hyde Park is of particular relevance because the stairway having been closed to the public since 1932, there is some chance the vent duct has not been repainted since, and presumably wouldn't have been repainted for at least a few years prior to closure either. Brompton Road has been closed since the same era, but the stairway was so heavily rebuilt while used by the army that I'd consider it's paint colour (dark green) irrelevant. Finally, the earliest colour image of a tube spiral stair I now of is this 1929 print in the British Museum collection link. It would also appear to show the vent duct in a cream colour, though as a print is of course not entirely reliable. |
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Post by cfmrc on Dec 3, 2023 23:41:49 GMT
Many thanks for those suggestions. Cream
It is then. The Cally was extensively renovated in the not too distant past. The green there is pretty lurid and the cream will help to reflect the light down the shaft (I don’t want to put LEDs in the stairwell itself). It’s surprising really that there isn’t an official building painting specification somewhere for the era.
Tim
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Post by burkitt on Dec 4, 2023 18:47:26 GMT
There's an outside possibility the TfL corporate archives have an official paint spec in their collection, though I can't find anything mentioned in their catalogue online - link. However not many records exist for the interior design of the stations. Even for the famous Leslie Green tiling there's only snippets supplemented by inferences made from the limited surviving material and building fabric. |
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DWS
every second count's
Posts: 2,421
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Post by DWS on Dec 5, 2023 6:58:06 GMT
Re the paint colour of vent shaft at York road I have no idea, but in the 1920s most paints would have contained lead and the range of colours would not be as great as today.
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