Urban And Industrial Decay

[Jackie]

Urban and Industrial Decay photography is a love of mine.

It's strange how people can have something so big, a place so complex, and just abandon it, of course there are much more beautiful photos which can be found, these are mediocre compared to some that you can see, but they still all contain something very sad, yet very beautiful. So many memories seemingly lost forever, then suddenly, shared with so few people.

Very short descriptions are above each picture.


Sawmill.



Terre Rouge,(Central Thermique) <"Red earth, central heat?" I don't know, my French is rusty>



Turbine hall, it looks like a lot of people will have lots their jobs.



Crane cabin.



Cellulose factory......formerly.



Cooling tower.



I think that large pictures are automatically scaled down, but if not, then i'll have to fix them myself.

[Kobuk]

Wow.  Those are cool pics. They all look like they could come from a sci-fi/horror movie or be places in a post apocolyptic Earth setting.

[Jackie]

Go look them up ^-^ there are hundreds of thousands of photos of places, who knows, the next great beautiful photo opportunity might just be in an abandoned building on the outskirts of town

I think with these types of places and things, there is so much more to see, more colours, less flatness, it's strange I guess it also feels cool the way that your mind tries to visualise what things looked like before.

It's as close as you can get to fallout

Search for Chernobyl urban decay photos, some of those are pretty cool! Some of the first that got me into them.

I'll add some better ones later

[Sergalicious]

31 abandoned places and a few from this site


there are more but there are 2 of my favorites

[Aryd]

I don't want to set the woooorld on fire...

[Jackie]

Yeah, the hospital and asylum ones can be really creepy sometimes, especially dark ones ^-^

Hehe, seen all of those before, in fact...

This picture of the house of the Bulgarian communist party, was my screensaver for a while.



And this one just reminds me of the days of fearfully reading through Metro 2033 at night with a head torch in bed XD



Hehe, I accidentally managed to get Dark Ones, and Metro 2033 in the same post!

[GrayWolf448]

yay the метро2033! i loved that game :3

metro looks cool in Russian :3

i mostly like the industrial pictures. i not a big fan of like old buildings i mostly like old machinery

and here is the most known disaster. welcome back chernobyl!

[Jackie]

Old and decaying places may contain much sadness, and many fading, eerie memories and items, but to me, it only adds to the melancholy form of beauty they have ^-^

A hidden Chamber Of Secrets it seems, and some beautiful architecture! ^-^



A stairway descent into hell?



Damp theater stairwell,lots of textures! ^-^



Quick! Reactor number two is about to explode! >_>



Photographers from then and now ^^

[The Rockin Hyena]

Great, Great Bear!  I like this more than you know.  I am working on shipyards and old abandoned vessels.  This is good stuff.  I didn't know anyone else liked this stuff.

[Jackie]

Haha! There are thousands of people who love it all! ^-^

Old schools, hospitals, and homes/apartments, and industrial sites are what I enjoy the most, they just make me smile, but make me sad at the same time, so many faded memories and items untouched and unmoved for so long, and just to know that there was so much activity there, and now nothing, it induces an extremely surreal and sad/beautiful emotional state that really sticks with you, that's why people love all of the post apocalyptic genres of gaming, and film, and literature.

Doing things like standing there, alone, and for example, trying to imagine the people bustling through that damp old theater staircase to see the next act with their friends and lovers when it was shiny and in use, and then looking at it now. It's also very sobering yet comforting, reminding us that everything dies, and decays, but it doesn't mean it has to be sad, and can't hold beauty still...

I feel very honored to have, in my own experiences, been one of a very limited number of visitors to many very beautiful places, all I need is me, my torch, my gas mask (In cases of Asbestos), some water, some lunch, and a mobile in a waterproofed bag, with some earphones and some deep focus music. If I had a good enough camera, I'd take pictures, but I find it rather more lovely to have my memories of my experiences as just that, memories, precious and personal experiences of that strange form of beauty. ^-^

I'd place the experience about on par with looking at the lovely stars alone in the woods, and just taking the wonder of it in!

The sense of beauty, and yet also the sense of a strange sadness is very hard to describe, but it's wonderful indeed!

It's definitely my favorite method of escape from the world, to share someones old memories, and go back to another time

[Jackie]

The Newington Home and Hospital for crippled children

The Edifice...



A fallen soldier lays at rest beside his vehicle



An unopened gift box containing a rather ornate Christmas cherubim ^-^



I wonder who was the last to exit through here?...



I often like to curl up beside the fireplace......although it looks like the paintwork is doing a good job of that!...Cosy! ^-^



*Sighs*.........I miss school meals....



The Newington Home for Incurables was founded in 1898 for children afflicted with conditions such as polio, cerebral palsy, and spina bifida. The hospital's founding was spearheaded by Virginia Thrall Smith, who championed for the care of disabled children. Two sites in downtown Hartford proved unsuitable, as the public would be "exposed" to the children and their infirmities. Finally, an abandoned farm was offered at the base of Mount Cedar in Newington, and the 10-bed hospital was constructed under the leadership of the Connecticut Children's Aid Society.

The home offered little more than comfort and care to the children during the early days; staff would take children on outings, and resident instructors would teach lessons. The patients, called "inmates" back then, would work the farm with the staff to provide fresh vegetables, meat, eggs and milk for the institution. In 1913 the society had a small hospital for orthopedic surgery constructed, as well has a residence for both children and staff. This dormitory building featured a balcony which overlooked a vast lawn, where Franklin Delano Roosevelt would give a speech to a crowd assembled below in 1930. Acknowledging that the children were not in fact "incurable," the name of the institution was changed to the Newington Home for Crippled Children in 1917.

The hospital bloomed from 80 to 200 children between 1917 and 1933, and began to gain a reputation in rehabilitation and orthopedics. The hospital was a long-term care facility for many children, but its mission was moving towards comprehensive care. New buildings and services were added in the 1950s and 1970s. In 1986, Newington Children's Hospital moved to a new facility in Hartford, however the former grounds are still used by administrative functions of Hartford Hospital.

The old dormitory for both children and staff had sat unused for quite some time until it was demolished in 2008. For more information on the institution, check out the book They Called it 'The Home for Incurables': Newington Children's Hospital by Barbara Donahue (2004).

All photography rights are reserved for; Copyright, © Tom Kirsch....

[The Rockin Hyena]

I know a cool cat named Wladimir who grew up very near Chernobyl. He has told me stories and showed me pictures of how he played in the water etc.  He is very healthy and athletic despite where he played as a child. Of course his family moved away after the disaster.   
 One thing that I like to do is toss a small piece of metal or rock down the stairs of an old ship, or into a hold, then just listen.   No music for me, this is a peacefully time.