Golden Lane Estate
Bayer House EC1Y
Part of Golden Lane Estate which was the first public housing to be listed. A maisonette with many of the original detailing and finishes.
Architect: Chamberlin, Powell & Bon
Year Built: 1957

I think my love for the Golden Lane Estate has surpassed my love for the neighbouring Barbican Estate. This may have something to do with the fact that I have come to accept that I will never be able to afford to buy anything on the Barbican Estate (over £500k for the smallest studio nowadays) whereas the dream of living in the Golden Lane Estate seems ever so slightly more within reach (the author of Modernistestates.com has just listed her very nice, well laid out studio for a sensible £380k – see http://www.modernistestates.com/post/97639180610/studio-flat-cullum-welch-house-golden-lane-estate )

It occurred to me on this visit that the buildings comprising the estate are all really quite different looking to one other yet have enough features in common for the estate to tie together as a whole. The injection of colour into the external walkways, window frames and doors also gives the place a slightly less gloomy feel than the wall-to-wall grey concrete of the Barbican Estate. The communal areas are all immaculately kept and there’s a pool in the centre of the estate, housed in a modernist-looking flat-roofed building.

The flat pictured below is part of Bayer House, a series of split-level maisonettes stacked on top of each other in a red, grey and brick coloured building. The ground floor is comprised of the living room and separate kitchen. Stone, wall-mounted steps jut out of the wall into the living room and lead upstairs to two bedrooms and the bathroom. The living room faces out onto a leafy porch and the grounds and the staircase is lit by a double-height window that also opens out onto the porch.

This flat provides the perfect setting for the owners’ mid century furniture (though I got the impression that they had bought it all the first time round and selected so well that their home still looks contemporary today).