Much as I'm a fan of orrible brutalism, that YP building has always struck me as a bit of a stinker. Is it pebble-dashed?? Why would you pebble-dash lovely, pure, naked, expressive concrete?!

John Madin saved his best for Birmingham rather than us - Pebble Mill and Brum library in a different league to the poor YP building, although it appears he (or the newspaper) gave it modestly funky interiors when built.

More likely exposed aggregate.

It's a rare building in so far that it looks much better in the dark, when it was flood lit, it looked alright, in the cold light of day, it's hideous.

Place it next to the poor dead International Swimming Pool and you can see where the city planners were heading in their thinking when laying out what was probably seen as a "gateway to the motorway city of the north".

Leeds Leads and all that...

The photo is circa 1970/71 and the first Yorkshire stage of the M62 from the Lancs border to Outlane only opened in 1970 well before the first McDonalds arrived in the UK. Prior to that the trip to away games in Lancashire was an all day event. Wallace Arnolds used to send a fleet of coaches often stopping for a pint and a sandwich at the old "Nont Sarahs" pub which overlooked Scammonden reservoir and the Stott Hall farm before if became famous.

Now that is interesting because I'm assuming that the Dortmund barrel man has always been int he same place as he is now but I didn't know that he pre-dated the St Johns Centre, AND although I'd have passed that way zillions of times I can't recall the top of the street looking like that, I thought there was a garage where those houses were, IN FACT the more I type this the more I realise that the barrel man must have been somewhere else in this photo ?

Really?
I had no idea!

No, I'm pretty certain that's still Dortmund Square. The building in the background to the right of the barrel man is still there in some form, I think.

Re the Dortmund Square area, this view is almost as bamboozling as the one of the YP buildinghttp://farm1.staticflickr.com/68/215341532_01e24940c4_z.jpg" >

Thanks for the confirmation.

You can see the barrel man in that photo in Dortmund Square which was taken prior to St Johns Centre being built.

The building in the background to the right is rlFairfax Houserl which has since had a facelift, but more importantly, it's had a wash.

Street heading down towards Dortmund Square is Wade Lane.

Wade Street is the right turning halfway down Wade Lane.

Merrion Street bottom right hand side of the photo leading to junction of Albion Street and Woodhouse Lane.

High rise building to the right was Dudley House... Leeds Careers Office used to be in there along with council rent office... (it's now The Cube). I can't recall if Dudley House was completely demolished and replaced by a new high rise which is now The Cube, or whether it was a refurbishment.

Leeds Permanent high rise block is now demolished and replaced with The Light.

The bit of the building in the far left centre of the photo was Schofields which is now demolished and replaced by the Schofields Centre.

Every shopping centre erected in Leeds during the 1960's onwards have been disgustingly awful, and we've another monstrosity to look forward to on Eastgate soon as I believe Hoagy's (formerly Tam O'Shanter and before that, Yorkshire Hussars) has finally closed it's doors prior to that whole length of building being demolished in the very near future

Didn't there used to be a pub in the building that now contains the Eastgate jobcentre?

In the early 80s, a treat for me if out shopping with my mum was to have sausage and chips in the Schofields self service. Even at the age of 10 I remember being upset when they pulled the place down and replaced it with the crappy mall-lite which today is just a commercial disaster area.

rlThis linkrl has lots of images, of which this view, for some reason, stands out most of all for me - the oft-travelled corner between the car park, Schofields and Beatties.