Central Liverpool: The Town Centre

	Bluecoat Chambers This lovely Queen Anne-style building was founded in 1708 by Mr Bryan Blundell and Rev. Robert Styth and completed in 1725 as 'a school for teaching poor children to read, write and cast accounts'. Originally called the Bluecoat Hospital, it is the oldest surviving building in the centre of the city and is the work of an unknown architect. Blundell was a leading Liverpool shipowner, reputedly the owner of the first ship to enter the town's first dock in 1715, and slave trade. Styth was the first joint Rector of Liverpool, based at St Nicholas Church on the waterfront. Both men were aware of the problems of orphan children in Liverpool, large numbers of whom were left destitute by the loss of their fathers at sea. The school moved to Wavertree in 1906 and was narrowly saved from demolition in 1907 by a donation from soap magnate William Hesketh Lever, funded by part of his winnings in a libel suit against the Daily Mail. The building has had various functions since, latterly an arts centre.
	The Carnarvon Castle The Carnarvon Castle on Tarleton Street, off Church Street, is a little gem of a pub tucked up Tarleton Street near the main shops and obviously popular with shoppers. It is about 200 years old and the inside is comfortable, small, old-fashioned and unspoilt. One of the best of the more modest style ale houses in the city centre.
	St. Luke's Church and Bold Street
	St. Luke's Church The work originally of John Foster the Elder, founded in 1802 and completed by his son to a new design in 1831, St Luke's is a prominent Liverpool landmark, dominating the view up Bold Street. The church was bombed during World War II (1941) and narrowly escaped demolition in the 1950s and 1960s but is now preserved as a memorial to the Liverpool blitz. It is known locally as the 'bombed-out church'.
	The Vines This baroque fantasy on Lime Street was built for brewer Robert Cain, one of a number of pubs in the city demonstrating his commitment to flamboyant architecture. Known locally as the Big House, it was constructed in 1907 to the designs of Walter W. Thomas, he of Philharmonic Dining Rooms fame, on the site of an earlier pub owned by one A.B. Vines. The clock was made by the same company that made Big Ben. The interior is similarly sumptuous, with an abundance of carved mahogany, plaster friezes and copper-work.
	Epstein's Statue Jacob Epstein's bronze figure on the prow of a ship above the main entrance to the Lewis's department store building dates from 1954-6 and stands for the resurgence of Liverpool after the war. The panels beneath, also by Epstein (1955), show scenes from childhood - the new generation of Liverpudlians (myself included). In fact, the store was devastated in the blitz of May 1941, parts of the earlier building of 1910-23 remaining only at the eastern end on Renshaw Street. Epstein's statue is the origin of the phrase 'standing there like one of Lewis's' applied by scousers to anyone who has been 'stood up'.
	The Globe The Globe on Cases Street, off Ranelagh Street, is a fine unspoilt pub, dating from 1888. There had been a pub of the same name on the site from 1859, which had earlier been the premises of a spirit merchant. The fireplace in the rear room and some tiling and friezes belong to the original building. An unusual and initially unnerving feature is the floor, which slopes upwards considerably towards the rear.
	Lime Street What is perhaps Liverpool's most famous street was once known as Limekiln Lane, named after the industry operating on the site of the present station in the 18th century. The Steble Fountain in the foreground is backed by the Empire Theatre and the North Western Hotel.
	The North Western Hotel Alfred Waterhouse's 1871 North Western Hotel (originally the station hotel, now student accommodation for John Moores University)
Liverpool's manufacturing industry in Lewis's Topographical Dictionary of England (1848) The manufactures of the town are principally such as are connected with the port and the shipping, the promotion of its commerce, and the supply of the inhabitants. There are two sugar refineries carried on upon a very large scale, some extensive glass-houses, breweries, tanneries, salt and copperas works, iron and brass foundries; foundries for cannon, anchors, chain-cables, and the several parts of machinery connected with steam-engines; manufactories for steam-engines, steamboilers, and machinery of all kinds, and for guns, small arms, nails, files, ropes, sails, and cordage; also numerous corn-mills, and mills for grinding mustard, colours, and dye-woods. The manufacture of soap exceeds that of any other place in England, and the manufacture of tobacco and snuff is very extensive; the number of watches made annually, on an average, amounts to 11,500, a number greater than that of any other town, except London.
	The Grapes Situated in Matthew Street in the Cavern Quarter, the Beatles centre of the universe with it's reconstructed Cavern Club and autumn bank holiday festival, the Grapes is a great little pub. It was a haunt of the Beatles in their early days and the evidence is there: a little known photo of the four of them drinking in the pub with wall paper in the background a scrap of which is still preserved.
	The Grapes More Vermeer than Sergeant Pepper? This corner of the Grapes looks more like one of the Dutch master's interiors than a shrine to pop culture. The rest of the pub retains much of this original character, though, in common with many old pubs, the tiny rooms have been opened up.
	The White Star The White Star on Rainford Gardens, off Whitechapel, is a fine, unspoilt Victorian pub in the Cavern Quarter that is full of charm and character. Named after the shipping line, it has appropriate memorabilia inside, along with wood panelling and a huge Bass Brewery mirror.
	Chavasse Park The new Chavasse Park is an elevated open space in the Liverpool One development above a large underground car park. It opened in 2008 on the site of the original park, named in honour of the Chavasse family: Francis (2nd Bishop of Liverpool) and his sons Christopher Maude (World War I chaplain, Olympic athlete and Bishop of Rochester), and Noel Godfrey (World War I medic and twice winner of the Victoria Cross).
	One Park West 17 storey One Park West, completed in 2008, was designed by Argentinian architect Cesar Pelli of Petronas Towers (Kuala Lumpur) fame. It consists of apartments, offices, restaurants, cafés and parking, located at the edge of Chavasse Park. Not alone among Liverpool's new buildings, it has been a butt of controversy from the architectural press.
	Paradise Street Liverpool One is the new shopping, residential and leisure centre of Liverpool, completed in 2009 and developed by the Duke of Westminster's Grosvenor Group . It is situated on 42 acres (17 ha) of previously underutilised land and is intended to give Liverpool a dramatic lift in its ranking among British retail destinations and to boost the local economy. It is the largest city centre development in Europe since the post-war reconstruction. When work began in 2004, archaeological investigations were undertaken, as the site covered the ruins of buildings destroyed in World War II bombing and the Old Dock, the world's first wet dock. Part of the latter may be viewed through a glass window near the John Lewis store.