Dreamland in disrepair

The Save Dreamland Campaign was launched by Joyland Books in January 2003 and is now supported by several thousand people. This is the place to discuss all aspects of saving Margate's famous amusement park and its iconic , Grade II listed Scenic Railway, Britain's oldest roller coaster.

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Dreamland in disrepair

Postby Nick » 16 Mar 2019, 11:10

Details of a Dreamland-related book that is now available on joylandbooks.com:

Dreamland amusement park in Margate, Kent opened to the public in 1920 though its site has an even longer historical link with fairgrounds, having been first used for amusement rides as early as 1880. During the height of its popularity it was one of the UK’s best-loved amusement parks and a top tourist attraction. Years of steady decline and a slow dismantling of iconic rides led to the park’s eventual closure in 2003. Yet it retained a place in the hearts of many local people and when plans were announced to develop housing on the site a decade long public campaign was triggered with the aim of restoring it as a fully operational amusement park. The campaign succeeded and the park reopened to the public in Summer 2015.

Rob Ball remembers the park with great fondness from his own childhood visits. In ‘Dreamlands’ he incorporates colour photographs of found objects and of the park as it fell into disrepair, as well as black and white archive photographs and tintypes. The tintypes use a process created in the 1860s, around the same time that the Dreamland site began being used as an entertainment venue. For Ball, tintypes emphasise the physicality of the landscape and its imperfections and he used the process to document the initial stages of reconstruction at the park. On each visit he had to construct a temporary darkroom in which to coat, sensitise, expose, develop and fix the tintypes. Dust, debris, fingerprints and even the quality of daylight are all recorded on its surface, so that each plate carries evidence of the environment it was made in and even of the photographer himself. The process itself also has strong historical links to the seaside where itinerant photographers would set-up temporary studios offering family portraits to weekend and holiday visitors.

http://joylandbooks.com/books_new/dreamlands.htm
Nick
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Re: Dreamland in disrepair

Postby Jim Douglas Jr. » 07 Jun 2021, 17:14

Interesting story, but why posted under this title?
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