West Pier, Brighton - December 2018

Brighton's West Pier

The photographs for this months blog were shot on a very stormy day in Brighton on the south coast of England at the iconic West Pier. We were in Brighton to see Kevin Bridges (a Scottish comedian) at the Brighton Dome. We we stayed the night at the Grand Hotel which is located on the blustery Brighton seafront and which was already all decked out for Christmas .

The West Pier has been derelict for many years now, although as I child on holiday here in the 1960’s I can just about remember it when it was open.

The pier was designed by Eugenius Birch and opened in 1866 but closed 109 years later in 1975 and has since become increasingly derelict. The earlier second Palace Pier built in 1823 is going strong and is still today a popular tourist attraction.

Today the pier is owned by the West Pier Trust who have put forward a number of plans to restore it but none have materialised due to opposition by some local residents and the owners of the nearby Palace Pier who claim the development would be unfair competition.

The photographs below were all taken from the beach and all were shot on my Sony A6500 and edited in Lightroom and Photoshop to varying degrees.

West Pier

West Pier

Palace Pier