Liverpool is a city full of history and wonderful artefacts - but some you may not have noticed.
There are many elegant buildings in the city centre, including Three Graces, to Liverpool Town Hall to the Liver Building - these are the places that are hard to miss. However, when walking around the city there may be some sights that you have not noticed.
Some of these look unassuming and others are even hidden. You could even have walked by these lesser known spots without taking them in. Back in January 2020, the ECHO published a long list of 49 things dotted around Liverpool city centre that you probably didn't know were there.
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Some of these include the 'bewitched spring' to the the hidden drinking fountain and even a white liver bird. Many of these city centre sights have a fascinating history.
The long list of hidden spots in our city centre offer a reminder of just how steeped in history Liverpool really is. Keep an eye out when you're next in the city centre for these gems - it could change the way you see the city.
Town Hall animals
Exotic animals carved into the sandstone frieze at the top of Liverpool Town Hall.
Can you spot the African elephant, bison, crocodile, camel and lion?
White liver bird
A white liver bird standing above a carved sailing ship on Mersey Chambers in Covent Garden.
Often called the “third liver bird”, it overlooks St Nicholas Church gardens and is older than the more famous pair topping the Liver Building opposite.
Brass cross
A tiny brass Maltese cross embedded in a paving stone outside TopShop on Church Street.
It marks the position of the altar in St Peter’s Church which was Liverpool’s pro-cathedral until it was demolished in 1922.
Stone tree
What looks like a massive stone piece of seaweed near to the Churchill Way flyover.
Created for Liverpool’s Garden Festival in 1984 by sculptor Stephen Cox, Palanzana is a tree-like form surrounding a sphere.
Hidden drinking fountain
Set into the red brick wall of Princes Dock is one of many red Aberdeen granite fountains Victorian cotton merchant Charles Pierre Melly created to make drinking water available to Liverpool people.
‘Bewitched spring’
The city’s only natural spring can be found in St James Garden beneath Liverpool Cathedral.
It was discovered by some quarry men in 1773 and is believed to contain healing properties. However, some people believe it is haunted water and turns black when you boil it.
Leather Lane
Find this narrow street at the side of Rigby’s pub on Dale Street and take a trip into the city’s history.
It takes its name from Leather Hall, the leather market that stood here until 1833. Famous horse painter George Stubbs, whose father was a tanner, grew up just a handy few streets away from here.
Jurassic fossils
The streets around St George’s Hall bear traces of prehistoric times - you just have to know where to look.
On the William Rathbone statue in St John’s Gardens you can find 150m-year-old clam markings. And there is a groove in the pavement at the top of William Brown Street from a fossilised fallen tree. The Bavarian granite used to build the MetQuarter contains large fossilised molluscs also from the Jurassic era.
Celebration of bodybuilding
A plaque marking the Arnold Dyson Gymnasium is on the wall at 26 Oxford Street - he was the first British professional Mr Universe, winning the title in 1953.
Another Liverpool
Under your feet as you walk up the steps in front of Lime Street Station are drawings etched into the york stone paving.
Created by artist Simon Faithfull, they depict sketches he made while travelling from our Liverpool to Liverpool in Nova Scotia, Canada, by container ship, train and bus.
Night and Day
Walk behind the George’s Dock Building Mersey Tunnel shaft to discover two Art Deco black basalt sculptures.
Created by Edmund C Thompson for the building’s completion in 1934, they were replaced in 1994 having been in storage for some years after being stolen.
Kissing Gate
Another sculpture created for the Garden Festival, the forged steel gate features sheep’s faces and a pair of canaries.
Its creator Alain Ayers was inspired by the sweet tune sung by male canaries to attract a mate.
Tigers’ heads
A pair of ferocious tiger heads cast in bronze adorn the doors of the former Bank of Liverpool on Water Street.
It is said that Lascar Indian seamen used to rub their heads for good luck. Do you dare put your hand inside their mouths?
Street named after a pirate ship
Originally called Jamieson Street, Pilgrim Street was renamed after a privateer known as “The Pilgrim” which arrived in Barbados with a “prize” and cargo that sold for £190,000.
Composers’ rooms
Until the recent episode of Carpool Karaoke, the most famous thing about the Philharmonic Pub may have been the Grade I-listed gents toilets.
But have you noticed that some of the rooms are named after famous composers Liszt and Brahms? Both, incidentally, were known for being a bit too fond of drinking.
Foot scrapers
Many of Liverpool’s stunning city centre terraces have these small metal bars at the side of their front doors for visitors to clean their boots on before entry.
Rodney Street is a good place to spot them.
Remains of Walkways in the Sky
In the 1960s, Liverpool City Council came up with the bright idea of building walkways above the existing streets that people could use to avoid traffic.
Sadly much of it was never completed and the rest has been pulled down. But you can still find traces - from the bricked up gap on Moorfields Station where a bridge used to cross Old Hall Street to the apparently random balconies around the St John’s Centre.
Confederate connections
Rumford Place, tucked away between Old Hall Street and Chapel Street, was once home to offices with a direct connection to America’s Confederate states.
At the time the Civil War broke out, 60% of their cotton was coming through Liverpool. The buildings are marked with plaques showing their Confederate-linked names.
Sanctuary stone
This circular stone on Castle Street is believed to have marked the boundary of a medieval market. The centuries-old stone was relaid in its original position in 2011 after being moved for roadworks.
Alongside it was laid a newly minted pound coin, as well as pennies from 1937 and 1947 - when it was last dug up.
Literary wall
The giant gold-coloured wall on the back of Liverpool Central Library used to be a visual treat for those driving over the now-closed Churchill Way flyover, but is still worthy of a detour.
It features a polished black granite section inscribed with the names of the city’s most famous writers.
Egyptian Sphinxes
Look up when visiting the University of Liverpool’s Victoria Gallery & Museum and on the Ashton Building next door you will see a pair of Sphinxes
Pool of Life
Philosopher Carl Jung, who never visited Liverpool, once had a dream about the city saying “I found myself in a dirty, sooty city. It was night, and winter, and dark, and raining. I was in Liverpool.”
He climbed up some cliffs and discovered a plateau where streets converged - which Bootle poet Peter O’Halligan decided in the 70s must have been on Mathew Street. You can find a bust of Yung as well as a plaque proclaiming: “Liverpool is the Pool of Life” in a recess outside Flanaghan’s Apple.
Secret garden
This may not be a new one for many Scousers but students and newcomers to the city, who may be reading this, will be unaware of the tiny oasis hidden in the middle of Liverpool ONE.
The Bluecoat’s garden is a sanctuary from the busy shopping streets. Buy a coffee, take a seat and relax
Lusitania propeller
One of the four 22.5 ton, four-bladed propellers that drove the Cunard Line's RMS Lusitania across the Atlantic on her tragic final voyage in May 1915 can be found on the quayside near the Albert Dock.
It was salvaged from the ship’s wreck off Ireland in 1982 and was bought by the Merseyside Maritime Museum in 1989.
Bridewells
There are several old police lock-ups in Liverpool city centre.
Charles Dickens famously visited the one on Campbell Square, which is now a pub called Bridewell. The Bridewell on Prescot Street has been home to artists’ studios for decades and the former prison building on Cheapside is now student accommodation.
The Pooley Gates
Liverpool’s Sailors Home on Canning Place was an imposing sight sadly lost in 1974 when it was demolished due to bomb damage during the World War II.
You can still see its gates, however, as they have stood close to John Lewis in Liverpool ONE since being returned to the city in 2011. Designed by West Derby-born Joseph Pooley, and featuring one of the oldest examples of the Liver Bird motif, they had been standing in a West Midlands factory for 60 years.
Overhead railway tunnel entrance
Head south along The Strand and you will eventually see the bricked-up entrance to the 1896 Liverpool Overhead Railway tunnel high in the cliff face below Grafton Street.
Titanic Band Memorial
Titanic ’s musicians bravely playing on as the ship sank to soothe their fellow passengers is one of the most courageous stories to come out of the disaster.
But did you know the viola player was from Liverpool? A wooden tablet dedicated to the memory of John Frederick Preston Clarke and his colleagues is on display in the Philharmonic Hall.
Secret shop ping street
Grade I-listed Queens Avenue is often missed by people walking along Castle Street but it is definitely worth a special visit.
Lined with Georgian lampposts it is home to a range of shops and businesses including independent wine merchant R&H Fine Wines and gallery Dot-Art.
Red telephone box
There are, of course, a few of these still around, but have you ever noticed the one inside Liverpool Cathedral?
The building’s architect Sir Giles Gilbert Scott was commissioned by King George to design a phone kiosk - and he came up with the famous red K6 cast iron box. Now Scott’s smallest creation stands inside his largest.
Message in Morse code
On the curved wall that runs along the corner of Old Hall Street and The Strand are the words Permission to Come Aboard written in Morse code.
It forms part of the Connections - Face of Liverpool sculpture by Stephen Broadbent that also features faces captured in glass portholes representing Liverpool’s diverse gene pool.
Liverpool Cityscape
It’s amazing how much the city’s world famous skyline has changed over the past decade - and you can realise just how different it now is by looking at Ben Johnson’s art work on the top floor of the Museum of Liverpool.
Commissioned to create The Liverpool Cityscape for 2008, the artist took more than three years and used 11 assistants to paint it based on his own drawings and 3,000 photographs.
An American Eagle
A gold-coloured eagle marks the spot on Paradise Street where the world’s first US consulate stood before closing after World War II.
Perched above Cote Bistro, it is a replica - the original was removed in 2003 when the development of Liverpool ONE began. You can find it in the Museum of Liverpool.
Liverpool’s forefathers
So many of our streets were named after the men who played a part in Liverpool’s history.
Among them are Rodney Street (after Admiral George Brydges, the 1st Baron Rodney), Parr Street (after banker Thomas Parr) and Mann Island (after oil-stone dealer John Mann who died there in 1784). There are also one or two named after women - such as Hardman Street, named after Mrs Hardman, the widow of John Hardman of Allerton who originally owned the land the road ran through.
Sadly, the history books we’ve read did not record her first name.
Scrapping kids
We’re all so busy either ogling or averting our eyes from Dicky Lewis on the front of the former Lewis’s department store that most of us haven’t noticed the reliefs above the doorway.
They show a baby in a pram, children playing and a group of kids fighting.
Old Dock
Thousands of shopper walk past this innocent looking window that looks down inside the secret tour of Liverpool's historic Old Dock - underneath Liverpool One.
Thousands of shopper walk past this innocent looking window that looks down inside the secret tour of Liverpool's historic Old Dock - underneath Liverpool One. Peer down through a hole in the concrete outside John Lewis by the Liverpool ONE steps and you will be able to see the city’s Old Dock.
You can also take a tour of what was the world’s first commercial enclosed wet dock.
Wall of Fame
If you tend to use Mathew Street as a shortcut to get across town, or you only go there after a few Jagerbombs, then you may not have noticed - or have forgotten noticing - the wall of discs.
Located next to the bricks bearing the names of musicians and bands who have played The Cavern, Liverpool Wall of Fame is a tribute to those Liverpool artists who have had a number one hit.
Ghost signs
These wonderful traces of Liverpool’s past can be found faded on buildings across the city, as well as in the city centre.
This one, for Joseph Glover & Sons, plumbers, painters and general contractors, is on Knight Street.
Rooftop pineapple
Castle Street is packed with incredible listed buildings that feature a range of decorative styles.
A favourite has to be the stone pineapples topping one of the buildings on the west side of the street, close to Cafe Nero.
Eleanor Rigby
Tommy Steele's statue of Eleanor Rigby sits and watches the world go by in Stanley Street
Ironically, this depiction of poor lonely Eleanor from the Beatles song is often overlooked. She sits on Stanley Street, next to the Metquarter, and is there to be a friend for other solitary types.
Even if you have spent some time with her, you may not know that she was made by Tommy Steele, the entertainer, and objects contained inside the sculpture include a copy of the Liverpool Echo.
Gold bullion
Martin’s Bank Building on Water Street has to be one of Liverpool’s most beautiful.
From its gorgeous painted wood panelling to its fine tiled floors, it is definitely worth a visit when it sometimes opens to the public for Heritage Open Days. In 1940, as the threat of German invasion loomed, much of Britain’s gold reserves were moved to the bank’s vault.
There’s a plaque on the wall next to Exchange Flags to prove it.
Memorial Garden
When Liverpool One was being constructed, Joseph Williamson’s grave was discovered on the site of what had been St Thomas Church graveyard.
The Mole of Edge Hill, who was responsible for a network of tunnels under Liverpool, had been buried in the Tate family vault under the church. It is now marked with a memorial garden, opposite the entrance to the Q-Park at John Lewis.
Symbols of justice
While it’s hard to miss the stone lions on the plateau of St George’s Hall - and the grandness of the hall itself - it is easy to ignore the decoration on the side of the building. Here, a series of panels reminds us that one of the hall’s original purposes was as a law court.
They show a child, representing Justice, gradually growing into a mature woman and eventually passing into a higher sphere of immortality.
Moonwalk
There can be few people who haven’t yet taken a selfie with Paul Curtis’ Liver Bird Wings mural in the Baltic Triangle, but have you seen the rest of his work?
The Liverpool artist was particularly busy in 2018 and created some amazing paintings across the city. You can find his Michael Jackson Moonwalker mural on the corner of Colquitt Street and Seel Street.
Needle
It’s hard to imagine the Pier Head without the Three Graces, and the Port of Liverpool Building is the most lavishly decorated of the trio.
On the top of its 220ft central dome, which was actually part of the Lutyen’s unused design for Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral, is an Egyptian-style needle.
Liverpool Mountain
It’s bright colours may be hard to miss but if you haven’t taken a stroll around the Albert Dock recently then you would be forgiven for not knowing Ugo Rondinone’s Liverpool Mountain art work.
Commissioned by Liverpool Biennial and Tate Liverpool, it is more than 10m tall and is similar to technicolour towers he has created in Miami and Las Vegas.
Original seven streets
You can still walk along the roads that made up the original centre of Liverpool - but their names have changed.
High Street, where the Town Hall stands, was once called Juggler Street. Look for the plaques marking the locations of the seven streets.
Coat of Arms above a busy shop
Have you ever noticed how grand the building housing Marks & Spencer on Church Street is?
That’s because it was once a hotel. You can still see the coat of arms high above the main entrance.
Stage door
As you are hurrying along the outside of the St Johns Centre to Williamson Square, take a moment to check out the unimposing stage door at the side of the Playhouse theatre.
Imagine the huge names who have walked through it over the years - among them Michael Redgrave, Anthony Hopkins, Robert Donat and Rachel Kempson.
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