Franchise Street – BrownhillsBob's #365daysofbiking

June24th – Franchise Street, Darlaston. On an otherwise decaying, unremarkable house, a silver dragon fineal tops the gable.

I have no idea. The house was hard to photograph, as the neighbours were about.

Is this culturally significant somewhere do we know?

October 18th – I’ve been in Darlaston all this week, and Kings Hill continues to pique my interest. As well as some great faded architecture, this characterful post-industrial borderland between Walsall and Sandwell contains a really great park. Recently refurbished Kings Hill Park – which I erroneously referred to as King George Park in an earlier post for some reason – is hilly, wooded and beautiful. There’s a wonderful new sculpture, and the whole place is wearing autumn beautifully. Emerging into Franchise Street, I admired the view of St. Matthews, Walsall over the rooftops. There are some fantastic old houses here.

Darlaston is full of surprises.

June 30th – Thursday took me into the Black Country. Returning via King’s Hill Park, making a call at the hated PC World in Axletree Way, I took a spin down Franchise Street. I noticed that the view from the town end was wonderful, across rooftops to St. Matthews, Walsall and beyond to Paddock. Tameway Tower is also prominent. The sixties were cruel to Walsall, very cruel indeed.