Cheltenham

Pottering around yesterday I noticed that the old place is looking better than it has done for years. A lot of previously dingy side streets suddenly look all spruced up, St Pauls is undergoing almost complete renovation it seems, and the lower high street has been cleaned up nicely. I do think that for proper renewal that lower high street should be almost completely demolished and rebuilt though. Certainly that monstrosity that houses Wilkinsons and others should be rebuilt. something is going on to the old Littlewoods building; you could tell that it used to be some kind of post war reappraisal of the civic neo-gothic that populates the high Street (like the Smiths building) but I'm not sure what they're doing to it at the moment. Hopefully it's being demolished. Montpellier is looking great all the way along it now as well. I don't like Victorian or neo-gothic architecture much, for the reason that the medievals really believed it; and the Victorians started a revival because they didn't. But having said that, Cheltenham boasts some subtle and attractive versions of the genre: Francis Close Hall (formerly St Paul's College), part of the university of Gloucestershire; the chapel of the Boys' College; the Ladies' College and one or two others. Compare these with Keble College Oxford, which is not subtle, but to my mind is one of the most impressive achievements of the neo-gothic style. Cheltenham is known as a regency town but a lot of growth, especially cultural and educational went on in the Victorian period and after.