Despite its urban sprawl, Bristol can still be seen as a collection of distinctive geographic areas, each with its own history, which together give the city its identity. Here is information on just a few of them.

The Centre
Bristol's centre was originally near Bristol Bridge, at the crossroads formed by the High Street, Wine Street, Corn Street and Broad Street. When people refer to The Centre today they usually mean the area that was once the site of the Tramways Centre (the hub for the city's tram routes) between Broad Quay and St Augustine's Parade. This area was redeveloped in the 1990s in an effort to overcome congestion problems and to provide a more clearly defined and exciting public space. Critical reaction to the scheme has been less than enthusiastic, but there was little affection for how it looked before either.



The Centre, c 2005.

Many years ago, the place where the fountains now play used to be a busy dockside. The waters of the northern section of St Augustine's Reach – a man-made channel dug in the thirteenth century during the diversion of the River Frome – were covered over in the 1890s because of increased demands from road traffic. Its water still flows under the tarmac and paving stones. This is what the area looked like in the late eighteenth century when Bristol was at its height as a trading port.



Broad Quay, Bristol, attributed to Philip Van Dyke, c 1760 (Bristol's Musems, Galleries and Archives).

The Centre is the site of the Bristol Hippodrome, pictured below, which was built in 1912. West End shows that have been premiered here include Guys and Dolls (1953) with Sam Levene and Stubby Kaye, The Music Man (1961) with Van Johnson, and the Disney-Sam Mackintosh production of Mary Poppins (2004).



In the Gallery by Alexander J Heaney, c 1928 (Bristol's Museums, Galleries and Archives).

Temple
The lead statue of King Neptune in The Centre's pedestrianised area has been moved several times since it was cast in 1722. Here it is seen in its first home near Temple Church when it was still painted in colour rather than its current grey.



The Neptune, Church Lane, near Temple Church by George W Delamotte, 1825 (Bristol's Museums, Galleries and Archives).

The area of Temple, south of the Bristol Bridge, was given to the Knights Templar in 1145 by Robert, Earl of Gloucester and it is often referred to as the city's first suburb. The knights were soldier-monks who guarded pilgrims travelling to the Holy Land. Bristol gained control of Temple following the Reformation when the monasteries were abolished. It was once the centre of Bristol's weaving trade and the guild had its chapel in Temple Church. This area was among those targeted by German bombers in the Second World War and the church was severely damaged during the Blitz. (Read about the Blitz in the Bristol at War story on The Siege website.) The bombed-out shell is now a listed monument, owned by English Heritage. The tower is not leaning because of the bombing: it had already started to tilt when it was being built in the fourteenth century, but has managed to survive.



Temple Church pictured on the Church Crawler website.

Queen Square
Elegant Queen Square, one of the largest residential squares in Europe, was named in honour of Queen Anne when she visited the city in 1702. It was built on The Marsh, which had previously been used as an archery training ground, bowling green, boat yard and for general recreation. The square was once home to some of Bristol's wealthiest merchants as well as being the site of the first American Consulate in Britain, established in September 1792.



Queen Square Bristol from the North West Corner by Thomas L Rowbotham, 1827 (Bristol's Museums, Galleries and Archives).

The square was also the focus of the Bristol Riots of 1831, which stemmed from discontent at the corruption of city officials and the defeat of the Reform Bill. Many buildings were burnt to the ground during the rioting and several people were killed. Of those arrested by the authorities, four were hanged and nearly 100 transported to the colonies.



Bristol Riot, 1831 (Bristol's Museums, Galleries and Archive).

Although the destroyed buildings were gradually replaced, the square failed to recover its former prestige, most of the private homes becoming increasingly downmarket lodging houses, and during the late 1930s it suffered the indignity of having a dual carriageway built across it. In the 1990s, Bristol City Council initiated plans to renovate the square, removing the dual carriageway, restoring gravel paths, digging up tarmac to reveal the original setts (cobbles) beneath and planting mature saplings to fill gaps between the trees. The official re-opening of the square took place in September 2000 and it is once again one of the most attractive public spaces in the city. The surrounding buildings are now nearly all used as office space.



Queen Square, c 2005 (Destination Bristol).

Clifton
Many of the merchants who first lived in Queen Square had already started to move out to the new terraces of Clifton before the Riots took place. The manor of Clifton – then known as Clistone – is mentioned in the Domesday book (1085). It remained a small hamlet of scattered farms and houses until the 1700s when it experienced a building boom, having been purchased by the Society of Merchant Venturers in 1676. Wealthy city-dwellers were attracted by its clean air and the views across the downs and gorge, and the population rose from around 450 in the early eighteenth century to nearly 4,500 in the 1801 census. Clifton was incorporated into the city in 1835.



An early nineteenth-century watercolour of Clifton Gorge by Marianne Smith (private collection). This predates the building of Brunel's Suspension Bridge but the Clifton Observatory can be seen in the distance.

Visitors were also attracted to the hot springs here in Clifton and at nearby Hotwells, coming in the summer season before moving on to the even more fashionable Bath spas in the winter. The French Wars of the 1790s brought bankruptcy to many of the merchants and property speculators who had invested in the development of Clifton, bringing several of the building projects to a halt. Despite this set back, significant terraces and, later, villas continued to be constructed into the mid-nineteenth century and, architecturally, Clifton remains one of the most impressive areas of the city.



Royal York Crescent, built c 1791-1820, photographed c 2005 (Destination Bristol).

St Paul's
St Paul's was developed as a city suburb on Bristol's eastern fringe in the late eighteenth century to accommodate the rapid growth of the local population. It was originally home to the merchant class and Portland Square, now mainly used for offices, was once one of the city's most desirable addresses. St Paul's Church, which is to the east of the square, was known as the Wedding Cake Church because of its unusual tiered tower. It was completed in 1794, but was forced to close in 1988 because of its dwindling congregation. It is now home to Circomedia, the circus skills groups, and won the top accolade for 'Community Benefit' in the 2007 Royal Institute for Chartered Surveyors Awards in the South West.



St Paul's Church pictured on the About Bristol website.

In the nineteenth century, St Paul's was an industrialised area, having a particular speciality in boot- and furniture-making businesses. By the Second World War it had become severely neglected and run-down, with only those too poor to move away to the safety and comfort of the suburbs remaining in residence there. Some of the more decrepit terraces were replaced by new low-rise flats in the postwar period but this did little to stop the continuing blight. When migrants from the Caribbean began arriving in Bristol in the 1950s, it was one of the few areas in the city they could afford to live. Landlords let the buildings decay further, having no incentive to improve them as they knew their tenants were unlikely to find any alternative accommodation in the city. Despite the poverty and social inequality, with its associated problems of drugs and crime, there is a positive community spirit in St Paul's, marked by initiatives such as the Afrikan-Caribbean Carnival, which was founded in 1967, and by the St Paul's Unlimited scheme, which aims to make constructive changes to the environment and lives of the residents.



Image of the carnival pictured on the St Paul's Carnival website.

Bedminster
Bedminster, a royal manor listed in the Domesday Book and with Roman origins, did not officially become part of Bristol until the boundary changes of the 1890s, though it had long been considered as a city suburb. It lies south of the New Cut, a bypass to the river Avon running from Temple Meads to Hotwells, which was created in the early nineteenth century during construction of the non-tidal Floating Harbour.



Aerial view of the Avon and the New Cut in the 1930s, with Bedminster to the right of the picture.

The area prospered during the Industrial Revolution when it was home to collieries, brickyards, iron founderies, tanneries, glassworks, potteries, breweries, and glue-, paint- and paper-making factories. Between 1801 and 1851, the population rose from just over 3,000 to nearly 19,500 as people were attracted by the employment opportunities, and new or extended housing developments overflowed into Windmill Hill, Totterdown, Southville and Bedminster Down. By the end 1880s, when the Wills tobacco factory moved to here from Redcliffe, the population was nearly 80,000.



Headquarters of W D and H O wills in East Street, Bedminter c 1900.

Bedminster suffered badly during the bombing of the Second World War and also in the postwar redevelopment of the city, but has undergone a renaissance in recent years, in part thanks to the presence of the Tobacco Factory theatre and bar, and to a range of independent shops and businesses along North Street.

Sea Mills
During the slum clearances in the centre of Bristol after the First World War, people were encouraged to move from the city centre to new housing on the suburban fringes such as the Seas Mills Municipal Estate. Houses on the estate had their own gardens, indoor sanitation, hot water and lighter, better equipped kitchens. Fields and parks nearby provided play areas for children away from the streets, and new schools were also built. The disadvantage of these new estates was that they had few shops and were a long distance from work for those still employed in the city centre.



A family enjoying their new Sea Mills' garden in the 1930s.

In the housing shortage that followed the Second World War, temporary pre-fabricated houses were erected at Sea Mills, some of which are still occupied.



Pre-fabs in Sea Mills, pictured on the About Bristol website.

There had been a settlement at Sea Mills in Roman times and an attempt to build a dock here in the eighteenth century, but it was these postwar developments that made the area what it is today. Other areas that were originally established as garden-suburbs for the city included Knowle West and Fishponds.