First proper look at the old station. From the street it is the KK Cash and Carry, blue shutters down, buddleia growing out of the parapet. Above the shopfront, still carved into the gable, the year and the name: 1892, Levenshulme Station.
The cash and carry had already closed, but it had not been cleared. Someone had left a lamb carcass in the walk-in fridge, and it had been rotting there for a while.
The building was knackered. Water was coming through the roof, and at one point the fix was a tarpaulin, sellotaped to a hosepipe, running the rain down into a bucket. That was the level of maintenance it had been getting.
Behind all that, a lot of the original building was still visible through the shop fittings. Under the false ceilings there are timber vaulted roofs, and under the shop floor, parquet. A Victorian railway station wearing a cash and carry like a coat. You could see the potential straight away.
I left knowing this was going to be a long one.
Part of the Station South case study.