Weekly Photo Challenge: Unique


Rather uniquely this post to Mike Hardisty Photography is one of a kind. It’s my 400th post and there won’t be another one that is numbered 400.

Since the challenge was announced on Friday I’ve been thinking what to show. Did I have anything in my library of photographs that would meet this weeks brief? Of course I do, because every one of my photographs is unique.

What I like about photographs is that they capture a moment that’s gone forever, impossible to reproduce   Karl Lagerfeld

I think Karl was right. Even if I put my camera on burst mode and fire off 6 photographs per second, something will have changed. It might be a subtle change in the light, or the clouds have moved, maybe it’s a leaf on a tree, but there will be differences.

Today I was at The Spinnies which is a wild bird reserve in North Wales. It’s a great place to photograph different species of wild bird, especially as one of the hides, on one side, looks out onto the sea-shore and the other looks out over a small lake.

But I’m not going to show you any bird photographs. Instead it’s got to be the smallest house in Great Britain…and luckily I was able to stop off to photograph it this afternoon, on my way home from The Spinnies.

The Smallest House

The Smallest House in Great Britain, also known as the Quay House, is a tourist attraction on the quay in Conwy, Wales. It has a floor area of 3.05 metre by 1.8 metre (10 feet by 6 feet) and a height of 10 feet 2 inches, and was used as a residence from the 16th century until 1900. As its name indicates, it is reputed to be Britain’s smallest house.

The house was lived in until 1900, when the owner was a 6 ft 3 inch (1.9 meters) fisherman named Robert Jones. The rooms were too small for him to stand up in fully and he was eventually forced to move out when the council declared the house unfit for human habitation. The house is still owned by his descendants.

Smallest House

The house is currently painted red and stands near the Conwy Castle walls. On certain days it is open to the public and you can enter for £1.00 (or 50p for children). The area upstairs is so small that there is room only for one bed and a bedside cabinet. Visitors can’t walk about on the 2nd floor, but can view it from the step-ladder.

That’s it for this week. I forgot to mention, I’ve changed the theme, into something a bit more reader friendly (I hope). Let me know what you think about the new theme