To the baths

Bristol South Baths has that name because when it was built in 1931 it was not only a swimming pool, but also provided private baths (the kind that you bathe in, like the one in a bathroom at home) for the local population: most of the people who lived nearby worked in mines, factories, or on the docks, and most of the houses had no bathrooms, just outside toilets.

As part of the Southbank Bristol Arts Trail, a group of swimmers called Friends of Bristol South Swimming Pool have arranged to open up the bathing-baths for visitors to look around. This corridor has not been used by the public for 50 years or more. The paint on the ceiling is flaking off, the side-walls still have the original blue ceramic tiles to half-height, the original radiator units, and the original parquet flooring is intact too. There's no artificial light in this photo: daylight is flooding down through the circular roof-holes, and bouncing off the hard gloss-painted walls and ceramic tiles.