Clocks

Clocks on buildings are a dying breed; some have disappeared such as that which was once on Clydesdale House (now in Giles Circus), although you can see the marks of the hour indicators on the wall. However, a new digital display projecting from the Aqua Pharmacy in Duke Street shows the temperature and the time in turn, similarly the chemist on the junction of Wherstead Road and Rapier Street.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Mansion clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: Mansion clock 22018 images
Christchurch Mansion has a white, octagonal clockface above its main entrance, facing the Soane Street gates.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: St Margaret clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: St Margaret clock 2
The Church of St Margaret on St Margarets Green bears a fine, blue, octagonal clockface above its south porch.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: County Hall clock 3
County Hall in St Helens Street, once a fine, cared-for building and in 2018 vandalised and neglected with its clock smashed.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: St Clement clock   Ipswich Historic Lettering: St Clement clock 2
The Church of St Clement features a pierced clockface on the north face and a more conventional circular face in a stone roundel on the south face.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Forge clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: Forge clock 2
The curved former electricity sub-station built to power the electric trams, then Mortimers restaurant and most recently The Forge, meat-eaters' nirvana.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: St Clement clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: St Clement clock 2
The difficult-to-photograph Holy Trinity Church in Back Hamlet.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Custom House clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: Custom House clock 2
The campanile on the Custom House has impressive proportions with clear, well designed clock faces. There appears to be a tiny information plaque above the east-facing clock.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: St Mary-At-Quay clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: St Mary-At-Quay clock 2
St Mary-At-Quay has an octagonal clockface on the south of the tower and a circular clock, oddly situated next to a right-angle in the flint wall on the north of the tower.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Shamrock clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: Shamrock clock 2
Price the bootmaker, nowadays (2018) The Shamrock bar bears a fine clockface on the Tacket Street elevation.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Tacket St clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: Tacket St clock 2
Not far from The Shamrock is a public clock between the former Hot Off The Press print shop and the wine bar (names vary). It's not working.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: St Peter clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: St Peter clock 2
A small stone shield bearing a crucifix is just below the bell loft and below is a circular clock in a stone roundel, west side of the tower of the Church of St Peter.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Station clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: Station clock 2
The multi-level car park between Burrell Road and the tunnel entrance at Ipswich Station.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Sorting Office clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: Sorting Office clock 2
Having circumnavigated the whole Royal Mail sorting office site, we had nearly given up when the public clock (wrong, as it happens) was found near the postal boxes.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Archant clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: Archant clock 2
Once, presumably, part of the John Player (formerly Churchman's) cigarette factory. When occupied by Community Service Volunteers (CSV) and Ipswich Community Radio (ICRfm), this building was called The Point. It was also the site of the last horse trough in the town. Might have been nice if it had been kept for posterity, as in other towns. In 2018 this building is the new home of the Archant local newspapers, as testified to by the clockface lettering.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: St Mary Elms clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: St Mary Elms clock 2
The Church of St Mary-at-Elms in Elm Street has a notable redbrick tower with traces of darker brick diaper-work. The handsome black, circular clockface with gold hands and Roman numerals looks quite recent, or recently-restored.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Oasis Centre clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: Oasis Centre 2
On the junction of the upper section of Portman Road and Burlington Road is the English Presbyterian Church, now Ipswich International Church and the Oasis Centre. Its lofty tower and spire feature a clock face set into its own stone surround quite high above street level, so easily missed by pedestrians.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Samuels clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: Samuels clock 2
Next door to the former Grimwade's shop in Carr Street is H. Samuel the jeweller's shop which bears the typical shouldered square clockface with roman numerals – difficult to splay around the centre – projecting over the street.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Town Hall clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: Town Hall clock 3   Ipswich Historic Lettering: Town Hall clock 3a
The Venetian gothic Town Hall shown above with the Mannings pub sign in the foreground on Cornhill. The four-way clock tower is topped by a campanile, spirlet and a shining Neptune's horse (echoing the Borough coat of arms) weather vane.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: The Walk clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: The Walk clock 2
The flamboyant clock on the Tavern Street entrance to The Walk. The buildings constituting The Walk date to 1938 and were designed by Leslie Barefoot as celebrated on a Blue plaque.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Croydons clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: Croydons clock 2
Festooned with wrought iron, the double-sided circular clock of the former jewellers, Croydon's, still bears the company name years after the business disappeared. More on this building on our Tavern Street page.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Yorkshire Building Soc. clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: Yorkshire Building Soc. clock 2
This 'pushed back' corner building (Upper Brook Street/Tavern Street) dates from 1928-30 and stands opposite the Great White Horse Hotel. The asymmetrical octagonal format enables a much more regular use of the Roman numerals – comapare with the H. Samuel clock above. The Croydon's building is in the right background.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Cricketers clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: Cricketers clock 3
The Cricketers is one of the renowned 'Tolly Follies' and the one closest to the town centre. It not only boasts a four-way clock in the tower, but a nice batsman/wicket-keeper weather vane (just visible in our clos-up above) installed by Wetherspoons when they refurbished the building. A similar clock tower is seen on The Suffolk Punch on Norwich Road. All the Tolly Follies were designed by architect and illustrator John Shewell Corder who was also responsible for the Scarborrow shop in Dial Lane.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Yates clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: Yates clock 2
Car showroom, Barnes of Ipswich furnishing/haberdashers, Yates Wine Lodge, Wetherspoons Robert Ransome public house and ... Yates again. For a snowy 1950s view of the building when it was a car showroom, see our Egertons page.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: St Mary Le Tower clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: St Mary Le Tower clock 3   Ipswich Historic Lettering: St Mary Le Tower clock 2
St Mary-Le-Tower Church: the clock faces on the south and west of the Victorian tower.
Ipswich Historic Lettering: Arboretum clock 1   Ipswich Historic Lettering: Arboretum clock 2
The Lodge at the entrance to the Upper Arboretum (shown on our Christchurch Park page) has, until recently borne a handless clockface bearing the name 'Fisher... Ipswich'. Now refurbished, the new face bears the name of a former staff member at the park, 'G.G. Sampson'.

No doubt there are other public clocks further out from the centre of Ipswich. We have not gone out of our way to point out which clocks are stopped or set at the wrong time; let's hope that those responsible for the public clocks will get them running at the correct time.
See also The timeball that never was on our Nova Scotia page for another method of showing the time publicly.



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