Albania, driving and strolling around the Capital, Tirana

Government building in Tirana, capital of Albania.

Tirana is a city of trees, wide avenues, and parks and lots of modern buildings. The traffic lights include a half  arch which changes colour for traffic and pedestrians. Red, yellow, blue.

Walking

Tirana is a pedestrian friendly place that's good to stroll around. 

Walking from the central area to the pyramid, watch out for bicycle lanes, without any pedestrian area alongside. 

Colourful London - St James Street

London and cities in Britain and throughout the world are turning to colours. Wonderful colours.

These pictures were taken by me in St James Street. We walked from Baker Street station to Bond Street underground station.

Who is to receive the credit for this? Years ago the architect Le Corbusier built an estate in the sky near Marseilles in southern France. He was hugely influential. But, alas, only the skyscraper was copied, not the essential colours.

I remember when we first had semi-detached houses in London painted turquoise and then purple. People were horrified. One house was painted bright colour by people from the Caribbean. When you come from hot countries with colourful flowers all-around you, you are used to colours which match the landscape. Now that so many houses are colourful, one colourful building, even with a plain building beside it, or either side of it, does not stand out so much.

If you are a keen photographer look for the colours in London. We have murals. We have colourful buildings. Colourful people.


Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer.

Colourful Coggeshall - must see near Colchester on way to Clacton

Coggeshall has been known for its old buildings but not it has a new variation on the old, adding colours such as red to turn the old black and white medieval or Victorian building into red and black, and tasteful pastels of green and cream and pink and white and pale powder blue making a soothing, pleasing variety of shop and house fronts, reminding me of colourful coastal villages in Norway.

Even on a short ten minute stop we really enjoyed driving through, parking for a photostop, looking at the old frontages.

Even a modest house with no garden can be identifiable and jolly with a contrasting front door. Here adjacent houses are united with a white and green theme. One has a green door and white windowframes on yellow background, The other has white door and windowframes on a green background.

Several buildings have interesting plaques.



A Bright Blue Building
Even the brightest blue looks great.

The blue of the tower is echoed by the blue square notice, and the small blue circular plaque over the door. 

Bright blue wooden horizontal planks, a yellow door, a green plaque, adjacent green wall with the blue noticeboard - it works. As you see the address is Stoneham Street.

One brightly coloured building amongst a sea of black and white, early browns, or granite, grey would look garish. But once you have a few colourful buildings, the others blend in beautifully, preserving the quaintness of the quirky old, yet creating a lively, clean, modern welcome.

I loved the houses decorated with the dog and birds, creamy yellow and brown.

Another has a white fleece ram, on an all white house, white door, white window frames, white front, very clean and fresh.

Photos by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

Angela Lansbury is a photo-journalist, travel writer, author, speaker.

See next post about the vineyard restaurant and shop on the way out of Coggeshall driving back to London.