Closing Time - The Lost Pubs of Liverpool

Closing Time is a book of colour photographs by Kevin Casey documenting the closed and abandoned pubs throughout Liverpool’s working-class communities. Taken between 2007 and 2010, the images are a stark representation of the decline of ‘the local’ as patterns of life and work have changed.

Although focusing on Liverpool, Closing Time highlights a national issue. The pressures of the smoking ban, cheap supermarket alcohol, recession and the attractions of home entertainment have all taken their toll on the traditional, working-class night out. Since 2005, over 6,000 of Britain’s pubs have closed, representing a great loss socially, architecturally and economically.

Casey’s photographs also highlight the wider issue of Britain’s urban decay that, far from being turned around by the regeneration schemes of the 1990s and 2000s, has continued apace in most parts of the UK. Closing Time is an arresting collection of 80 images that captures these buildings at the point just before most of them will be gone forever. The book also contains a series of accompanying texts complied by Kenn Taylor which explore both the images and the issues around them.