Wood: 3 - a Village Washing Line
If you live in a medieval village, you probably won't have a garden and if you don't have a garden, you won't have a washing line. So what do you do? Well it's obvious - you hang your washing out of the window and in this case on wooden shutters.
This post is for Margaret, my friend in Cumbria who paints beautiful water colours - often featuring a line of washing hanging out to dry.
Your recent photos are all stunning, Jilly. I sometimes come and page through your blog and just fantasize a life in Menton or Gorbio.
ReplyDeleteSo ... why do medieval villages not have gardens?
ReplyDeleteAnd ... how do they dry their sheets?
Julie, these are 'perched' villages - build on the top of a hill or mountain, often as a sort of fort to prevent invasion. Around and below the village, people often have land to grow crops but they wouldn't walk all that way to hang clothes. Of course there are always a few gardens but not many. You always see clothes hanging outside windows, or, where there is a square, people hang their washing on wire fencing around the square.
ReplyDeleteThis is LIFE, daily life, -and a well captured shot with few but nice details.
ReplyDeleteI like the sound of "living" when I walk in narrow roads...., and I can image that this is a place like that.
I probably should explain further by saying the houses are cheek by jowl holding each other up, hence no gardens.
ReplyDeleteMany thanks, Jilly. It is fascinating to see how the decisions made centuries ago, are still impacting on the current villagers. Not sure I could cope with the concept of "cheek by jowl" - not having grown up on a quarter-acre block!
ReplyDeleteI am applying to do a Grad Dip in History by research and my thoughts are to research the spread of retailing in the early colony, how it spread by gully and ridge and how this effects the city even today. I think you will see the impact on Sydney Eye should I be accepted into the course. It was doing SE that got me interested in the topic to begin with!!
The wood looks almost too fragile to support the weight of laundry.
ReplyDeletec'est interdit en ville ;o))) utilisation optimale des volets
ReplyDeleteI don't think they stick to the rules in villages, Olivier! We see it in the Old Town of Menton too, but right, not in the centre ville.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, Dina, that volet doesn't look strong enough, I agree.
Julie, your course sounds fascinating and I look forward to the outcome.
How cleverly those shutters are designed. And despite their disrepair, the laundress is making good use of their hinged feature. This reminds me a bit of the laundry seen hanging from the balconies and windows of San Francisco's crowded Chinatown neighborhood. I bet it echos laundry scenes from around the globe, but each with a specificity of place in the details of the scene, such as your aged walls and "Place de la Reublique" street marker. Lovely composition, Jilly, and I wish I had some of that woman's wardrobe, actually. the leggings and the brown top, maybe the cargo shorts and the white empire top. . .Very fun!
ReplyDelete-Kim
I've seen a lot of moments like this in the villages and towns throughout Switzerland and France. It always makes me smile. Sometimes, the old way of doing things just makes sense, despite modern conveniences.
ReplyDeleteHow clever!
ReplyDeleteJilly, in response to your question regarding the sepia tone in my photo on Avignon in Photos today :
ReplyDeleteI use Photofiltre as a post processing software and if you click on "hue variation" you can bring your photo to monochrome, choosing your base colour to be anything from purple to green, blue, yellow or red : you just move a cursor along a rainbow scale. I find that if a use an mid-orange tone (around 45°) the final rendition is a very nice sepia tone.
Try to look for "hue variation" in your post processing software and tell me how you go?
couleurs du sud
ReplyDeleteYou did get the way of life in this shot.
ReplyDeleteI'll bet Margaret can make a beautiful painting out of this. I have often hung laundry out a window when I didn't have a porch, and draped sheets over two close doors!
ReplyDeleteYears ago I ran across a blog that had a washing line theme, and, believe it or not, it was fascinating. Love the "line" for the clothes.
ReplyDeleteI loved the image immediately. But reading the comments has been every bit as illuminating. CDP is such a wonderful forum, isn't it?
ReplyDeleteWell I love some wash on a line but this is equally as interesting. Good catch Jilly.
ReplyDeleteNathalie,
thanks for the sepia info. I use Iphoto and sometimes my sepia suits me and other times not so much.
V
Fascinating pic, pretty white top too...
ReplyDeleteAnd in Paris, I do the same, during the night, during the day, it's forbidden as Olivier said. And in summer time ! Otherwise, at this time of year, my laundry would be more wet than immediatly after the washing.
ReplyDeleteNice picture Jilly as always, with atmosphere. Have you seen the sealed up window just next to this one ? Funny, why opening a new window at 30 cms from the previous ?
Lovely! Wonderful composition with the street sign on the right.
ReplyDeleteWe have similar looking solutions here in Italy too. I posted some laundry hanging to dry in the sun yesterday too...
Ciao
I suspect the fact that clean clothes and the art of making them so is such a universal ideal and practice is what makes "laundry" a subject loved by so many. When my wife and I were in Switzerland and Italy a couple years ago she was always on the look out for great clothesline images. Many were to be had, and now she has a nice collection hanging in her laundry room.
ReplyDeleteThis is a wonderful image in its utter simplicity.
Catherine, all four windows seemed normal to me but I must look next time I go to up the village. I think one was closed but the shutters were open. The others the same. Didn't realise one was sealed.
ReplyDeleteNathalie many thanks for the information. V helpful!
Isn't it interesting how in Europe hanging clothes on the wooden shutters is utterly charming...and here in the states it's considered shabby, trashy, all manner of horrible things....
ReplyDeleteBeautiful capture!! Catches the everyday life very well.
ReplyDeleteI was just going to say that this is something you would never see in Paris; not allowed and then I read Catherine's comment! :-)
ReplyDelete