VO, Liverpool, 2010
VO, Bold Street, Liverpool, Merseyside, L1, England, 2010
Falcon Security, Liverpool, 2010
Falcon Security, Norfolk Street, Liverpool, Merseyside, L1, England, 2010 • Previously show in the distance in distance here.
E Alarms, Liverpool, 2010
“E Alarms” burglar alarm, Liverpool • As in Ebeneezer Goode? • Spotted: Bold Street, Liverpool, Merseyside, L1, England, 2010 • Politics: In the Labour constituency of Liverpool Riverside
Panda, Liverpool, 2003
“Panda” burglar alarm, Liverpool • A close up of one I featured ages ago here for its colourful location. • Spotted: Argyle Street, Liverpool, Merseyside, L1, England, 2003 • Politics: In the Labour […]
Expo, Liverpool, 2010
“Expo” burglar alarm, Liverpool • Blue version of one I’ve already featured in yellow. • Spotted: Greenland Street, Liverpool, Merseyside, L1, England, 2010 • Politics: In the Labour constituency of Liverpool […]
Expo, Liverpool, 2008
“Expo” burglar alarm, Liverpool • I love this one, even if they aren’t strictly soundwaves. • Spotted: Town centre, Liverpool, Merseyside, L1, England, 2008 • Politics: In the Labour constituency of […]
Saturn Protection, Liverpool: space probe
"Saturn Protection" burglar alarm, Liverpool • On the mythology front, Saturn was an ancient and rather complex Roman god. However this design concentrates entirely on outer space, quite a lot of which has been crammed in: a magnificent section of ring-swirled Saturn, with a jaunty space probe bearing a tiny "S" logo circling it. It's possibly Pioneer 11, the first probe to Saturn. Excellent! • Spotted: Town centre, Liverpool, Merseyside, L1, England, 2008 • Politics: In the Labour constituency of Liverpool RiversideMAS, Liverpool: cathedral
"MAS Formby" burglar alarm, Liverpool • This is on Liverpool Cathedral (the C of E one) - there's a distance shot of it here. Given it nearly reads Mass, the Catholic one might have been more apt. • Spotted: Town centre, Liverpool, Merseyside, L1, England, 2008 • Politics: In the Labour constituency of Liverpool RiversideSolo, Liverpool: alone
“Solo” burglar alarm, Liverpool • Could refer to Star Wars‘ Han Solo, or even cold war spook Napoleon Solo (Robert Vaughan in The Man from U.N.C.L.E, kiddoes), but as this is a musical […]
“Ultra”, Liverpool: verily
"Ultra" burglar alarm, Liverpool • More Latin, though this just means very very very very. Which is, verily, quite an avant-garde name for a burglar alarm. • Spotted: Stanley Dock area, Liverpool, Merseyside, L3, England, 2008 • Politics: In the Labour constituency of Liverpool Riverside“Arrowe”, Birkenhead: sharp shooter
"Arrowe Security Systems" burglar alarm, Birkenhead • Another alarm named after the Arrowe area of Wirral, this is an earlier incarnation of yesterday's logo. That modern one was curving and wafty like a hot air diagram, in caring sharing hug-a-hoodie style. But this straight arrow harks back to a harsher, more forceful era – the kind of weapon to shoot an errant intruder stone dead. Nice! • Spotted: Shore Road area, Birkenhead, Merseyside, CH41, England, 2008 • Politics: In the Labour constituency of Birkenhead“Falcon World Class Security”, Liverpool: stunted
"Falcon World Class Security" burglar alarm, Liverpool • I reckon this is a relative of the Liverpool falcon in a circular niche featured here, athough it's a slightly different design. "World Class Security" – I like the grandiloquence of such ambition. And it purports to be a registered trademark, too! Because there must be loads of security firms keen to rip off a logo that looks like a stunted griffin. • Spotted: Town centre, Liverpool, Merseyside, L1, England, 2008 • Politics: In the Labour constituency of Liverpool Riverside
“Panda”, Liverpool: cop car
"Panda" burglar alarm, Liverpool • There are more old Pandas on Merseyside than there are in the wild. This seems like the millionth example I've published, but I love these vintage boxes so much I need to show them all. Panda is such an odd alarm animal that I'm wondering if the name is a reference to police cars rather than cuddly endangered bamboo-munchers. "Panda car", referring to any smallish patrol vehicle, seems a cuddly and endangered term itself, harking back to the days of Z-Cars and Dixon of Dock Green. The phrase apparently originated on Merseyside, like this security firm; and the early panda cars had black, light blue and white panels, just like these sounders, which supports my thesis. A charming bit of Liverpudlian whimsy, whatever the derivation. • Spotted: Argyle Street, Liverpool, Merseyside, L1, England, 2003 • Politics: In the Labour constituency of Liverpool Riverside
Above: a real panda and a semi-real panda car (it's a TV prop)“Gemini Security Systems”, Liverpool: boring twins
"Gemini Security Systems" burglar alarm, Liverpool • Apart from the name, this is supremely boring – it could at least have included a picture of some twins. Astronomically, Gemini is one of the oldest-named constellations, dating far back into the Bronze Age and called "The Great Twins" by the Babylonians. To the Greeks they were the talented horsemen Castor and Pollux, who despite being twin brothers had different dads, meaning only Pollux was immortal; when Castor died, Zeus allowed him to share Pollux's immortality, bonding them together in heaven as the constellation the Romans called Gemini. Astrologically, it's the versatile third sign of the zodiac, ruled by fleet-footed messenger god Mercury. Gemini types are meant to be lively, inquisitive, communicative, inconsistent, and a bit unreliable – not all of which are useful traits for security firms. My theory for why Gemini is one of the few signs represented on burglar alarms, and a popular business name in general, is that Geminis are inordinately proud of their dual-natured and slightly annoying star sign characteristics. And, to prove my point, there will be another one along tomorrow... • Spotted: Town centre, Liverpool, Merseyside, L1, England, 2008 • Politics: In the Labour constituency of Liverpool Riverside
Above: the not-very-twinlike constellation of Gemini as it is usually depicted, from the digital sky images at www.allthesky.com.“MAS” burglar alarm, Liverpool: dirty great pile
"MAS Formby" burglar alarm, Liverpool • This carefully-placed burglar alarm is affixed to the great and grubby neo-gothic pile of Liverpool Anglican Cathedral, one of two such religious edifices piously dominating the city's skyline, bookending the aptly-named Hope Street. It's the cathedral that doesn't look like a flying saucer: the one that does is for Roman Catholics. The reason it doesn't look like a flying saucer is because it was designed by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, grandson of high Victorian goth Sir George Gilbert Scott (there's an alarm on one of his churches here); and although responsible for the magnificently monolithic Battersea Power Station and its modernist ex-power station sibling Tate Modern, Sir Giles wasn't into sci-fi-related structures – unless you count the red K6 telephone box. The hulking monstrosity of Liverpool Anglican Cathedral is not, in my opinion, amongst his finest works: perhaps because he was born a Roman Catholic. (I couldn't find an alarm on the RC Metropolitan Cathedral, by the way, though I had a good look.) • Spotted: Liverpool Cathedral, Cathedral Close, Liverpool, L1, England, 2008 • Politics: In the Labour constituency of Liverpool Riverside
“Panda”, Bold St, Liverpool: Greek key
"Panda" burglar alarm, Liverpool • This rusty relic is another Panda from Liverpool, seven years older than yesterday's example, and seven years more decayed. The killer detail is the white plaster frieze below it: a design known as a Greek key. Apt! • Spotted: Bold Street, Liverpool, Merseyside, L1, England, 2010 • Politics: In the Labour constituency of Liverpool Riverside
“Panda”, Argyle St, Liverpool: endangered species
"Panda" burglar alarm, Liverpool • This distressed turquoise building is genuinely beautiful, but sadly it got pulled down shortly after I took this photo. It was an old warehouse in Liverpool's docklands area, now redeveloped as Liverpool One and full of swanky flats. Look carefully at the top of the central pillar and you'll notice a matching turquoise Panda alarm – a whimsically-named brand that I've found only on Merseyside, and whose alarms seemed long-defunct even in 2003. There's a Birkenhead firm called Panda which claims to have launched in 2004, so that may be an offspring – unusual amongst Pandas. • Spotted: Argyle Street, Liverpool, Merseyside, L1, England, 2003 • Politics: In the Labour constituency of Liverpool Riverside
“Home Guard Vess”, Birkenhead: roadside icons
"Home Guard Vess" burglar alarm, Birkenhead • This, like yesterday's niche, comes from a Merseyside warehouse, though across the the river in Birkenhead. I found it during a rather anal search for 1930s Mersey Tunnel vents, immense rectilinear brick structures reminiscent of neo-fascist churches (there are some excellent photos here). Of course, due to its Irish heritage, the whole Merseyside area is strongly Roman Catholic – which lends these burglar alarm niches the feel of vigilant roadside icons. • Spotted: Shore Road area, Birkenhead, Wirral, CH41, England, 2008 • Politics: In the Labour constituency of Birkenhead
“Falcon Security”, Liverpool: tatty bird, nice niche
"Falcon Security" burglar alarm, Liverpool • I always enjoy burglar alarms' varied architectural settings: some languish in obscure corners amidst layers of grimy urban decay, whilst others are proudly placed and neatly painted around. Some are even fortunate enough to have their own dedicated niches, and it is to these that I turn this week. Having just finished a fortnight of random burglar alarm birds, my first niche is home to a rather tatty falcon (a species be covered more fully in a later series on hawkish alarm birds). This circular brickwork detail decorates a 19th-century warehouse near Tate Liverpool, now given over to that booming 21st-century descendant of warehousing, self-storage. • Spotted: Norfolk Street, Liverpool, Merseyside, L1, England, 2010 • Politics: In the Labour constituency of Liverpool Riverside
Nathan Barlex, Liverpool: a “fearful” art alarm
"Allotrope of Pyrolysis", 2010, by Nathan Barlex • My first alarm is in a category all of its own: an art alarm. It's a sculpture by recent RCA graduate Nathan Barlex, which I came across at this year's Bloomberg New Contemporaries (an influential yearly show of up-and-coming artists). Most of his current work is painting, but he also uses appropriated materials, though whether his name – which bears an uncanny resemblance to Charlie Brooker's hopeless Hoxton hipster Nathan Barley – is also appropriated, I have no idea. Speaking to Lydia Corry in Artvehicle 47, Barlex echoed my own thoughts on burglar alarms (though slightly more apocalyptically): "The alarm box is a ubiquitous object – it is everywhere. Alarm boxes have formed into a mini-culture of their own with a set of signifiers. There’s what’s printed on them; sometimes it can be an image of a dangerous animal, or a word like ‘thorn’. The shapes vary but they often use fearful geometric symmetry to imply an unnatural or even super-power. The icing on the cake is that many alarm boxes are just decoys, an empty promise filled with paranoia. They are the dubious uncle to the already malignant CCTV camera." You can see his work at New Contemporaries at the ICA, London till Jan 23 2011, or visit the artist's own Nathan Barlex website, where there's another burglar alarm dipped in sand. • Spotted: Bloomberg New Contemporaries, A Foundation, Greenland Street, Liverpool L1, England, 2010 • Details: alarm box, spray paint, crushed charcoal, approx 30 x 30 x 10cm
Burglar Alarm Britain 