Category: Architectural Tours
Barbican Estate and Golden Lane Estate Tour
I thought that I was fairly familiar with both the Barbican Estate and Golden Lane Estate (having, at various points, fantasised about living in both places) but a two-part architectural tour that I attended earlier in the year provided new (at least for me) insights into both.
Designed by famed architects Chamberlain Powell and Bon, the Golden Lane Estate came first with construction starting in 1952 and completing in 1962. The Barbican followed immediately after with construction starting in 1963 and completing in phases between 1969 and 1976.
The Barbican Estate was conceived with the ambitious goal of seamlessly integrating the war-damaged site into the larger fabric of the city. It is, however, widely accepted today that it fell short of this objective, creating a desirable residential enclave rather than a vibrant and inclusive part of the city.
Looking into the estate from the main entrance (a deliberately inconspicuous ramp not visible from the tube station or even the street), it was pointed out that the estate is full of structures and multi-levelled walkways that you can see but cannot get to without an intimate knowledge of the estate’s layout and a master key to get you through its system of locked gates.
In contrast to the almost impenetrable Barbican Estate, the Golden Lane Estate was designed with openness in mind, with multiple street-level entrances and ways into the estate resulting in most areas being accessible to the public including the communal lawns (save for one private garden) and landscaping. Even the shops built into the edges of the estate were designed to be quasi thoroughfares with entrances at either end and therefore accessible from the street and within the estate (though many have shut off the estate-side entrance as it is reportedly difficult to run a shop in this way).
Density and size also set the two estates apart. The Barbican Estate, despite being six times larger than the Golden Lane Estate (40 acres vs 7 acres) accommodates less than three times the number of people (100 people per acre vs 200 people per acre). While this affords Barbican residents more generously proportioned homes and space on the estate, we were told that there is much more of a sense of community and more opportunities for social interaction on the Golden Lane Estate. This can be attributed to there being less space, forcing people to interact in the smaller lifts and communal areas, but also because Barbican residents are reportedly more inclined to keep to themselves.
Despite the fact that the Barbican Estate is technically a council estate, owned by the Corporation of London, it was primarily designed with affluent residents in mind as the Corporation of London wanted to attract a specific demographic to the City of London, requiring potential residents to prove earnings of 5.5 times the rent of the flats.
Due to the introduction of the right to buy scheme in 1982, 98% of Barbican flats are now privately owned and this is likely to rise to 100% as we were told that when a rental lease ends on one of the few remaining Corporation of London-owned flats, they are sold on privately. In contrast, the Golden Lane Estate was designed as social housing for key workers such as policemen, nurses and street cleaners. Today, the Golden lane estate is 50% privately owned by long leaseholders (owing to the right to buy scheme) with the rest owned by the Corporation of London and rented out as social housing.
Walking around the gated parts of the Barbican Estate, there was a definite feeling of exclusivity and privacy – everything looked beautifully maintained and you couldn’t see anyone’s front door without further access keys (Lauderdale Tower and Cromwell Tower are the only apartment blocks that have their entrances at street level).
We were told that there was something of a class system within the Barbican Estate, with those in the larger three-bedroom flats on the higher floors of the towers (or indeed, the lucky few in the podium houses, which I visited back in 2017 on an Open House tour) feeling a sense of superiority over their less fortunate neighbours in the smaller flats and studios in the lower rise blocks on the estate (granted that this was just one resident’s personal perspective). It all sounded rather snobbish.
We were fortunate enough to be shown inside a Flat 1A type in one of the Barbican towers (this was the first time I had seen any of the communal areas up close – unsurprisingly, they were a lot like the public areas of the Barbican Arts Centre with similar fixtures and fittings). Photography was not permitted inside the flat so I have used photos of an identical flat in Shakespeare Tower that is currently for sale via Hamilton Brooks.
The flat had a straightforward linear layout which allowed for relatively generous room sizes compared to other flats on the estate split over several levels. The flat also had a sweeping balcony that swept around the perimeter of the living room and bedrooms.
The owner of the flat had retained the original underfloor heating and Brooks Marine bathrooms and kitchen, which reportedly still worked well despite falling apart due to the fact it was over 50 years old. We were told that it is a requirement under the lease to lay fitted carpets in all of the flats for noise insulation purposes. It is clear that not everyone observes this rule (many flats on the estate are ostensibly uncarpeted) but we were told that if someone complains, this term of the lease is rigorously enforced and flat owners have been known to be required to replace expensively fitted flooring with carpets.
We were told that the flats were designed with much less storage than people have today as people then generally had fewer possessions (though I still spied a number of fitted wardrobes). The flat was still serviced by the French patented and designed Garchey waste disposal system, which enables residents to dispose of small items of rubbish such as tin cans, though a lot of people have now removed their system (the system, we were told, sometimes smells). Rubbish is otherwise collected daily from small two-sided cubby holes outside the flats.
Walking around the Golden Lane Estate was an entirely different experience to the Barbican Estate. Having had it pointed out to me, there was that aforementioned feeling of openness and accessibility – you could see lots of people’s front doors (originally all flats on Golden Lane Estate were completely accessible but now have been fitted with entry phone systems) and while the buildings were laid out across a number of levels, everything was still very accessible with lots of ramps and a clear layout. Unlike with the Barbican Estate, it was very clear how to get everywhere on the estate.
Adding to the sense of community were the communal gardens (not enough room for allotments but residents tend to grow things in bags), the Sir Ralph Perring community centre for elderly residents in the middle of the estate (which contained some nice Ercol furniture), tennis courts and gym/swimming pool. By way of contrast, the Barbican Estate has no community centre (we were told this was quite fitting as there isn’t really a sense of community) and the on-site gyms are all privately owned by third parties.
It had to be said that the Golden Lane Estate was slightly less well maintained than the immaculate Barbican Estate with a few buildings showing signs of disrepair. Residents did, however, appear to make a lot of effort with their balconies and gardens with many of the flats allocated enough outdoor space for people to consider their own.
Compared to the uniformly brown Barbican Estate, the different residential blocks Golden Lane Estate were pleasingly colour coded, the best example of this being the 16-storey Great Arthur House, which stood in the middle of the estate clad in cheery yellow screen printed glass. We were told that the sculptural element at top of Great Arthur House was a tribute to Le Corbusier and that there used to be a garden for residents at the top of the building which was closed off after a number of suicides.
Other blocks included Cullum Welch House, which was comprised entirely of small 30m2 studio flats (we were told that these were so well designed that having less space per person didn’t mean that they were more cramped – they just required the resident to own less stuff), Great Arthur House containing one bedroom flats with very narrow kitchens (too narrow to even be a galley kitchen) and bathrooms, Bowater House, Bayer House and Basterfield House each containing two floor duplex flats and with cantilevered staircases (I visited one of these in Bayer House all the way back in 2014 when I started this blog and called it my dream home at the time) and Crescent house containing distinctive barrel vaulted studio flats with a small bedroom enclosure.
Gropius House, Lincoln MA
One of the last stops on our 2022 trip to Boston was the Gropius House in the town of Lincoln, Massachusetts, named after the celebrated architect and the founder of the Bauhaus school of design in Germany.
The Gropius House was built as a family home in 1938 and was a collaborative effort between Walter Gropius, his wife Ise and their friends who contributed Bauhaus art to the house. Having faced the closure of the Bauhaus school by the Nazis, Walter Gropius sought refuge in London before eventually settling in the US. Although he was unable to bring his monetary assets with him, he managed to secure permission to transport his furniture collection which means that the house now contains the largest Bauhaus furniture collection outside of Germany.
Originally advised to reside in Boston’s Beacon Hill, the Gropius family desired a more open and spacious environment which led to them choosing the leafy town of Lincoln. With a vision to create a Bauhaus-inspired home, the family received $20,000 from Helen Storrow, the prominent American philanthropist, which allowed them to transform a hilly apple orchard into what is now considered an architectural marvel.
Inspired by the New England landscape, Walter Gropius envisioned a house that blended the principles of the Bauhaus movement with the local materials and construction methods of the region. The wooden frame construction typical of the area was enhanced with shiplap, a colonial-style cladding and field stones at the bottom. The compact 2,300-square-foot Gropius House represented a New England interpretation of the Bauhaus aesthetic, defying convention with its shoebox-like design without a pitched roof—a radical departure from the norm at the time and which wasn’t always up to dealing with the challenges posed by the New England climate. The floorplan was carefully designed without corridors and modern materials (such as glass bricks, cork floors and porous plaster materials to enhance acoustics) were used throughout to maximise functionality.
We entered the house on the ground floor into an entrance hall containing an open coat rack, (displaying clothing that enhanced the room’s aesthetic), wide balustrades, a powder room, a door leading to the basement and a winding staircase with a bent steel balustrade leading up to the first floor.
To the right of the entrance hall was the study space, which was intentionally positioned on the northern side to avoid excessive sunlight and contained a double desk imported from Germany. This room also included a separate entrance door for clients, reflecting Gropius’ intention to use the house as a teaching tool to showcase his approach to design and construction.
The study space flowed into the living room, which looked out onto the surrounding environment through two large plate glass windows – an unusual feature for a house in New England. Most of the furniture in this room including the iconic Butterfly stools, daybed, standing lamps and the Womb chair, were designed by Marcel Breuer, a protege of Gropius at the Bauhaus.
Around the corner in the L-shaped living room was the dining area, zoned by a curtain, which allowed for dinner to be dramatically unveiled (I really think this should be brought back as a trend). The dining chairs were Marcel Breuer prototypes – the Gropius family often tried out out new furniture prototypes while living in the house, providing a unique opportunity to witness the evolution of design firsthand.
Dinner would have been prepared in the narrow but carefully designed galley kitchen, which was laid out to ensure everything as within easy reach and contained appliances (garbage disposal, dishwasher, cooker, and refrigerator) that would have been modern for the time. The kitchen had a “cold” section (the section nearest the door) and “warm” section (at the rear of the room towards the window) with the cold section acting as a buffer to keep kitchen smells contained (again – a great idea that is due a comeback). The metal cabinets were reportedly sourced from a medical catalog.
Upstairs, were three bedrooms and two bathrooms accessed via an expansive upstairs landing.
The master bedroom contained a heated dressing area with built-in table and an ensuite bathroom featuring his and hers sinks. The Gropius family believed that sleeping in natural air was optimal and so left the windows in the sleeping area open to allow fresh circulation throughout the night, which meant that it would get quite cold during winter months. I wasn’t sure about the grey, black and red colour scheme in this room – there was something of the 1980s about it.
The guest bedroom was next door with two single beds lined up against one wall, for guests to sleep toe-to-toe or head-to-head.
Gropius went above and beyond for his daughter’s bedroom, giving her a glass roof, separate entrance to the house and a personal roof deck.
The architectural overhang and sunshade allowed for cross ventilation, while the arts and crafts desk provides a nod to traditional craftsmanship. The room could also be divided into different spaces with curtains.
Outside the house was a small covered terrace where the Gropius family had meals and played table tennis. The surrounding perennial garden, inspired by both New England and Japanese aesthetics, reflected Walter Gropius’s love for blending cultures and nature.
The Gropius family lived in the house until 1969 and after Walter Gropius’s death, his wife Ise continued to live there until she died in 1983. Today, the Gropius House is managed by Historic New England and is open to the public for tours.
Alton Estate, Roehampton SW15
An in-depth tour of the Alton Estate, a large council estate situated in Roehampton, southwest London, was a new entry on the 2022 Open House programme. Designed by a London County Council design team led by Rosemary Stjernstedt, the estate consisted of a variety of low and high-rise apartment blocks divided into Alton East (completed in 1958) and Alton West (completed in 1959).
The Alton East Estate consisted of point blocks and low-level housing (e.g. wide townhouses) designed for the 1950s demographics of the time: a lot of single people and daughters (who had lost their partners in the war) living with their mothers with less of an emphasis on families with children.
Notable sections of the Alton East estate included Horndean Close, a cluster of staggered houses around a communal green, a fashionable idea in the 1950s designed to evoke the feeling of a village green in which the local community could gather. This layout was also cheaper to build because there was no need to factor in a roadway, which wasn’t a problem as most people didn’t own a car in the 1950s before mass car ownership caught on. The use of timber and concrete (used to material shortages in the 1950s) combined with the trees (the original Victorian trees were retained and further trees added at the time the development was built), gave the close an almost Scandinavian feel.
Other notable parts of Alton East were the Swedish-inspired ten-storey tower blocks built atop a hill on the estate, emphasising the steepness of the hill and contrasted with staggered two storey blocks in a different colour. Oliver Fox, the chief architect, based the design of these tower blocks on similar blocks built in Gothenberg and Stockholm and the Lubetkin-designed Highpoint in Highgate: four flats per floor built around a central staircase and lift with internal bathrooms (by the 1950s, electrics lighting was good enough to light internal bathrooms) and sticking out external balconies (like Highpoint but not Alton West – see below). The planting around the blocks was intended to give this part of the estate a northen European/Scandinavian flavour and the differing tile patterns at the entrance of each block was intended by Cox to give each block a distinctive identity.
Moving onto Alton West, this part of the estate was considered by many British architects to be the crowning glory of post-World War II social housing at the time of its completion in 1958, largely as a result of its response to its unique setting. Built on a large expanse of parkland on the edge of Richmond Park, Alton West contained a number of different housing configurations: twelve-storey point blocks with four flats per floor (these had internal covered balconies unlike the towers in Alton East); terraces of low-rise maisonettes and cottages (including a terrace of striking bungalows built to accommodate pensioners, a relatively new social group from the 1950s onwards – before, elderly people would either live with families or, more depressingly, in work houses) and, perhaps most recognisably, five eleven-storey slab blocks, heavily influenced by the Unité d’Habitation buildings by Le Corbusier, completed in 1952 and now Grade II-listed. I understand that Alton West (and more specifically, Minstead Gardens, one of the terraces of pensioner bungalows) was used as a filming location in the 1966 dystopian drama film Farenheit 451.
The five eleven-storey slab blocks turned sideways to Richmond Park (they were originally meant to face out onto park but it was decided that this would look like a vast wall from a distance).
Housing inside consisted of flats and maisonettes, many double height with bedrooms on the upper floor (people in the 1950s still insisted on going upstairs to bed) just like in Le Corbusier’s Unite d’Habitation buildings. Unlike the Unite d’Habitation buildings, however, these were just residential blocks with none of the communal “streets” of shops and facilities (or a rooftop paddling pool) in Le Corbusier’s designs.
Set apart from the five slab blocks built on the park land but very similar looking was Allbrook House, the very last building built on the estate in the early 1960s when economy was at its height. Allbrook House had a library with a distinctive curved ceiling at the bottom. This building has not been protected by the Grade II-listing and is scheduled for redevelopment in the near future.
Hatfield 20th Century Society Tour
The highlight of a recent C20 tour to Hatfield in Hertfordshire was the opportunity to visit the Grade II-listed Cockaigne Housing Group development.
With the name deriving from the Middle English word ‘cokaygne’ (meaning land of plenty) and designed by architects Peter Phippen, Peter Randall and David Parkes in the mid-1960s, the 2.8 acre development was inspired by communal housing projects created in Scandinavia and consisted of a staggered terrace of 28 houses built around communal gardens containing a tennis court, a children’s play area and a community house with a self-contained guest flat for visitors.
Each of the the houses (which appeared relatively narrow from the street) were built with a deep plan with accommodation arranged around a series of enclosed courtyards designed to allow sunlight to flow through the interior spaces, assisted by full height glazing throughout.
The development has been described by English Heritage as “the leading English manifestation of the courtyard house” and the houses as “consisting of a perfectly judged series of interlinked spaces which flow naturally one into another”. These spaces consisted of a front courtyard, hallway, kitchen and bedroom at the front, the dining area, living area and internal courtyard garden in the middle of the house and then further bedrooms, the bathroom and back garden at the rear.
We were fortunate to be shown around four versions of the same house, which had each been altered and renovated to varying degrees over the years. Two were in relatively original condition (houses 1 and 4 pictured) while two of the others had been sensitively restored into modern homes (houses 2 and 3 pictured).
Only one of the four (house 2 pictured) had the original internal courtyard in its original uncovered form – the others (houses 1, 3 and 4 pictured) had been converted into additional indoor living/dining rooms. I understood the rationale for converting this space but personally thought that the internal outdoor courtyard worked best.
The houses were unusual and definitely did flow well from one living space to another. Residents described the development as an enjoyable place to live with a great sense of community but complained of issues with the flat rooves (prone to leaks) and how the houses feel the weather (hot in summer and cold in winter). A recently renovated example of a Cockaigne house is currently for sale via The Modern House.
Other sights on the C20 tour of Hatfield included a number of other 1960s housing developments and the Marychurch Roman Catholic Church.
Dulwich Oasis 20th Century Society Tour
Even though I’m pretty familiar with Dulwich and its housing estates (having lived in Great Brownings since 2019 and house hunted rather obsessively in the area for a few years before that), I couldn’t resist joining a recent C20 tour entitled “Dulwich: Mid Century Oasis” run by C20 chair and local expert Ian McInnes.
The tour was a companion piece to McInnes’ excellent book, a deep dive into each of the mid century housing estates scattered throughout the area (still available to buy in Dulwich bookshops and online) and was no less comprehensive: over the course of five hours, we visited most of the estates in the area, including some interior visits into a number of types of property that I was previously unfamiliar with.
The mid-century modern housing estates of Dulwich were planned by the architects Austin Vernon and Partners and built by Wates after the Dulwich Estate knocked down most of the Victorian houses that populated an almost 20 acre area in 1950s after they suffered extensive bomb damage in WWII.
The tour started at the Dulwich Wood Park Estate, a cluster of apartment blocks that I became very familiar with during our property search. Supposedly Dulwich’s answer to La Villa Radieuse in Marseilles (I didn’t see much of a resemblance!), the apartments were designed in a way that isn’t often seen in new-builds: only four apartments per floor, generous proportions, dual aspect, separate kitchen. Priced at £3,000-4,000 at the time, these were relatively premium apartments.
Each of the apartment blocks were named after Elizabethan explorers and all shared similar communal areas with colourful tiling and terrazzo staircases though Knoll Court, the first to be built, had a few more elaborate details including a tiled mural and what might have been a water feature. The landings and corridors in all of the blocks were originally intended to completely open to the elements (like a lot of social housing blocks) but the architects decided against it.
We were invited to take a look around two stylish examples of apartments on the estate. Both had the standard layout with the large living area, two connected bedrooms and separate kitchen. Both apartments had the original screen dividing the hallway and living area removed – the correct design choice in my opinion. One of the apartments was on the 8th floor of one of the blocks and had almost floor to ceiling windows in the living room (albeit with bars across the bottom section of the window). We learned that these top floor apartments were something of an afterthought – the 7th floor apartments were originally going to be extra luxurious with a conservatory on the upper floor but it was decided that the 8th floor could be better monetised as a further four apartments. This explained why the lift only went up as far as the 7th floor with residents on the 8th floor needing to climb the final floor.
Next, we moved onto Rockwell Gardens, a terrace of three-storey townhouses with “caged” front gardens and tiled front facades. I recall viewing a house with this exact layout during our property search except that one was opposite the Horniman Museum on a very busy (and noisy) road. Like the one we saw, this house on Rockwell Gardens had four bedrooms (one of them up in the loft on the second floor), a separate kitchen and living area and a staircase that was closed off from the living area to allow residents to come in and out of the house without having to cross the living area (like you have to in a standard three-storey Wates townhouse with an open plan living area and staircase opening onto the living area). These houses were reportedly inhabited by a lot of diplomats when they were built (this was something to do with the ease of getting into Whitehall) and came with warm air central heating and a fireplace. These originally sold for £6,000.
The Whytefield Estate was a bus ride away. I was familiar with the townhouses on this estate, having viewed one during our property search, but not the intriguing one and two-storey courtyard houses.
We had a look inside one of the three-storey townhouses, this one with the zigzag windows on the first floor. These windows were installed, reportedly as an afterthought, in the townhouses on the estate that faced onto other townhouses so that the residents wouldn’t be able to see into one another’s houses (somewhat unnecessarily given that there gap running between the two facing rows of townhouses appeared to be about 20 metres wide).
This townhouse (like the one that I viewed during our property search) had its original ground floor layout intact – a utility room and a bedroom/study opening out onto a small courtyard garden, which in turn opened onto a communal courtyard. We were told that a lot of residents had converted this ground floor living area into an open plan kitchen living area with obligatory bifolding doors. Upstairs on the first floor was the living area and kitchen and three further bedrooms on the top floor.
Next, we were treated to a visit into one of the single storey courtyard houses. This intriguing bungalow had an unusually wide hall with the sleeping quarters straight (three bedrooms) ahead with a short flight of stairs on the left leading up into the living area with patio doors onto a courtyard garden. The courtyard garden also provided access to one of the bedrooms. These single-storey houses apparently sold better than the two-storey pyramid style houses (which we unfortunately didn’t get to see inside) due to the fact that the pyramid houses had upside down layouts (bedrooms on the ground floor and living area/kitchen upstairs).
I was also familiar with the next estate, Lings Coppice, having been inside a couple of the houses during our property search and also as part of the Dulwich Artists’ Open House event.
These two-storey terraced houses were designed by German designer Manfred Bresgen and had a distinctly European look. The original plan was to build more traditional-looking three storey townhouses in the Lings Coppice site but Waite was keen to minimise costs by building houses with two storeys rather than three. The estate was built on Radburn principles with the houses arranged around a central courtyard. These houses were to be designed to be deceptively spacious with deep floorplans and a skylight/double height atrium in the centre of the plan to allow light to reach all corners of the house.
The houses in Lings Coppice that we saw during our property search had been updated to varying degrees but this particular example had been radically transformed. The original galley kitchen had been completely removed and the living area/double height atrium area had been completely opened up to accommodate a kitchen area that was almost entirely comprised of a sleek kitchen island. The original garage had been replaced with a utility room though the original garage door on the front of the house remained intact to comply with estate rules. Upstairs, however, the floorplan had been left in its original configuration with four bedrooms, a bathroom and a strip landing overlooking the kitchen island below.
After passing through a number of other estates (Valiant Close, Loggets and Morkyns Walk), we ended up at the brutalist concrete part of Dulwich College, designed by WJ Mitchell in 1966 and completed in 1968. Originally intended to be a memorial hall, it is now used as a dining hall and occasionally as the venue for mid century modern furniture shows.
The final stop on the tour was Ferrings, part of the College Road Estate and arguably the most architecturally accomplished of the developments on the Dulwich Estate. While the original plan was for the College Road Estate to consist of four premium apartment blocks, there simply wasn’t the demand for flats at this higher price point in this area. As a result, only one of the four apartment blocks was built (Gainsborough Court on College Road) with interlocking single and two-storey houses (each of which cost around £15,000, a large sum in the 1960s) making up the rest of the development.
We were invited to see inside one of the single-storey ranch houses, which had a courtyard front garden at the front (onto which the front hall and dining room opened) and a walled garden (accessed via the 30ft long living area) at the rear. The house still had its original layout (many houses on the estate have been reconfigured) with a clear division of public and private living quarters and a number of original features as well, including the timber-clad double-height mono-pitch roof in the living room and an abundance of sky lights.
Modernist pilgrimage to Rotterdam
We recently decided to spend a long weekend in Rotterdam because: a) you can get there in about three hours from London on the Eurostar; and b) I really wanted to visit Sonnenveld Huis, which explains why the majority of this blog entry is dedicated to it.
Sonnenveld Huis
Sonnenveld Huis, a stunning 1930s residential property, has been open to the public since 2001. Designed by architects Brinkman and Van der Vlugt for Albertus Sonneveld and his family, Sonnenvleld Huis was built between 1929 and 1933 and is reportedly one of the best-preserved private houses in the Dutch Functionalist style in the Netherlands.
Sonnenveld Huis, exterior
Functionalist architects prioritised light, air and space, designing efficient and hygienic buildings using modern techniques and materials such as steel and concrete. Floor plans were designed to make internal spaces open and light, enhanced by balconies and terraces. Sonneveld Huis, which felt staggeringly contemporary for a building from the 1930s, was clearly built with these principles in mind. This feeling of modernity was enhanced by Albertus Sonnenveld’s installation of state of the art mod cons throughout the house including telephones in the bedrooms, wall-mounted climate control units, a massage shower with multiple shower heads and a system of music speakers throughout the house which could be controlled from certain rooms (a 1930s version of Sonos, if you will).
Sonnenveld Huis, exterior – terraces
Sonnenveld Huis, exterior – balconies and external door detail
Sonnenveld Huis, exterior – garden
Sonneveld Huis, interior door and wall-mounted climate control unit
The house was split over three floors. The ground floor contained the servants’ quarters, garage and a charming bright studio room for the Sonneveld daughters to receive guests.
Sonnenveld Huis, servants’ quarters
Sonnenveld Huis, the daughters’ studio room
Sonnenveld Huis, the daughters’ studio room – built-in seating with speaker embedded into the side
The curved main staircase led up to the first floor, which contained the living areas, starting with the kitchen (which was mainly used by the servants) and serving area from which food was passed into the dining room through a beautiful built-in shelf cum serving hatch.
Sonnenveld Huis, main central staircase
Sonnenveld Huis, kitchen
Sonnenveld Huis, serving hatch in dining room
The dining room flowed though into a very spacious living room which could be divided into two using a sliding partition wall. One end of the room opened out onto a large terrace at one end and the other end housed a library and an additional seating area (the high-backed orange chairs were for the men and the lower-backed orange chairs were for the women and their voluminous hairstyles).
Sonnenveld Huis, dining room
Sonnenveld Huis, looking back into dining room from living room and sliding partition wall
Sonnenveld Huis, living room
Sonnenveld Huis, living room – library area
The second floor contained the bedrooms: a guest bedroom (in which the colour scheme reminded me a little too much of a sanatorium), a separate walk-in linen room with extensive built-in storage and the daughters’ bedrooms which had a shared jack-and-jill bathroom in between them.
Sonnenveld Huis, main staircase on first floor and view from second floor landing into guest bedroom and linen room
Sonnenveld Huis, guest bedroom
Sonnenveld Huis, first daughter’s bedroom and shared bathroom looking through into second daughter’s bedroom
Sonnenveld Huis, second daughter’s bedroom
At the end of the hall was an impossibly glamorous master bedroom with a wraparound terrace, a large en-suite bathroom and a separate dressing room. The staircase on the second floor continued up to the roof, which was also used as a terrace.
Sonnenveld Huis, master bedroom – wraparound terrace
Sonnenveld Huis, master bedroom furniture and separate dressing room
Sonnenveld Huis, master bedroom – vanity unit
Sonnenveld Huis, master bedroom ensuite
This really was a very luxurious and expensive house. Clearly, no expense was spared at time on the design, furnishings and fittings (the carpets alone were ridiculously sumptuous). The unconventional use of colour was also stunning – I’ve never seen anything quite so glamorous as that bronze paint used on that curved wall in the library area and in the master bedroom.
Sonnenveld Huis, roof
Sonnenveld Huis, curved bronze wall in living room
Sonneveld Huis is absolutely worth making the trip to Rotterdam to see in person. The audio tour (informative but also quite irreverent) was excellent and the freedom to peruse almost every inch of the house at will was refreshing – you were even allowed to sit on most of the furniture!
Sonnenveld Huis, exterior from the street
Chabot Huis
Chabot Huis, a stunning modernist villa designed in 1938 by architects Gerrit Willem Bass and Leonoard Stokla, was a few doors down from Sonnenveld Huis. The villa was initially built as a private house for the Kraaijeveld family but has been used since 1993 as a museum dedicated to the painter and sculptor Hendrik Chabot.
Chabot Huis, exterior
Unfortunately, I didn’t get to see much of the interior of Chabot Huis because the galleries were closed for a re-hanging and when I tried to access the parts of the building that did appear to be open, I was unceremoniously thrown out after failing to produce a pre-booked ticket. I did, however, find some photos of the interior online.
Chabot Huis, exterior
Chabot Huis, interior shots found online
Cube Houses
The much photographed yellow Cube houses were an intriguing oddity; more interesting than actually impressive.
Cube houses, exterior
Built in 1984 by the architect Piet Blom and located on Overblaak Street above the Blaak metro station, the complex of homes, shops and a pedestrian bridge consisted of a hive of 51 cubes, all attached to one another. Blom’s innovative design involved tilting the cube of a conventional house 45 degrees, and fixing it on top of a hexagonal post. Each house had its entrance at the base of this post, which contained a staircase leading up into the cube itself.
Cube houses, exterior – staircase up to one of the residential properties
Cube houses, exterior
An owner of one of the cube houses had opened his home to the public as a “show cube”, which allowed us to see inside an example of one of the houses with most of its original features intact.
Cube houses, show cube interior – living room
Cube houses, show cube interior – first floor landing
Inside, the first floor of the house consisted of a living room and open kitchen, the second floor contained the sleeping area and a bathroom and the apex of the cube contained a further living area.
Cube houses, show cube interior – study
Cube houses, show cube interior – built-in storage
Cube houses, show cube interior – bedroom
The house did not seem like a very practical space to live in. The apex room at the top of the cube was stiflingly hot and all of the walls and windows were angled at 55 degrees which meant that about a quarter of the 1000 sq ft floorspace was unusable, giving the house a slightly claustrophobic feel. I must say that the colour scheme and sharp-angled built in furniture (futuristic through an early 80s lens) probably did not help.
Cube houses, show cube interior – apex room
Shopping
I didn’t have much luck on the shopping front in Rotterdam despite the abundance of appealing independent stores.
Shopping – Pannekoekstraat
Pannekoekstraat was a lovely street of boutiques and cafes just a short walk away from the super commercial Blaak area.
Shopping – shops on Pannekoekstraat
Hutspot, which I suppose would be described in pretentious retailspeak as a “lifestyle concept store” offered a combination of tasteful clothes, design objects and local art from a mix of established brands and young designers and artists. The stuff wasn’t cheap but it wasn’t ridiculously expensive either and the store reminded me of a more grown up, more premium version of Urban Outfitters.
Shopping – outside Hutspot
Shopping – inside Hutspot
Shopping – inside Hutspot
Shopping – inside Hutspot
The flea market at Blaak Maarkt in the centre of Rotterdam was a complete let-down. Though I’d read online that it hosts all sorts of vendors selling food, textiles, plants and antiques, it ended up being 80% food and 20% everything else. There were only a handful of antique stands selling the sort of tat that I tend to seek out when visiting flea markets abroad and I struggled to find anything interesting on any of these stands to photograph for this blog entry, let alone to buy and take home.
Shopping – flea market stalls at Blaak Markt
1970s/1980s-looking apartment complex
Given that the majority of Rotterdam was destroyed in the 1940s, a lot of the residential architecture was the sort of interesting, debatably ugly post-war stuff that I like. I know nothing about this 1970s/1980s-looking apartment and retail complex built around a waterway but the design was interesting enough for us to stop and take notice – look at those pull-down canopies for the slanting balconies!
1970s/1980s-looking apartment complex, exterior
1970s/1980s-looking apartment complex, exterior
1970s/1980s-looking apartment complex, exterior
Turn End house and garden
We spent the recent August bank holiday Monday visiting Turn End house and garden, the architect Peter Adlington’s family home in Haddenham, Buckinghamshire.
Turn End house, view from back garden
Peter Adlington designed and built a small development of three houses (The Turn, Middle Turn, Turn End) in the 1960s. They received a Royal Institute of British Architects Award for Architecture in 1970 followed by a Grade II* listing in 2006 and have been described as some of the most beautiful houses built in England since the war.
Middle Turn exterior
Path leading into Turn End house; Fibreglass shell chairs in front courtyard
While Turn End is still occupied by the Adlington family (and open to nosy members of the public to visit twice a year), The Turn is currently let out and The Middle Turn is privately owned and occupied.
Turn End house exterior details
Turn End house, view from back garden
Turn End, as far as I could tell, was a mostly single storey dwelling arranged around a central courtyard. The main entrance opened almost straight into the kitchen and dining area from which the living area branched off at one end of the house and a large home office at the other. Each of these three areas opened out onto the aforementioned courtyard.
View from entrance of Turn End house, looking through into central kitchen and courtyard (professionally taken photo from Turn End website)
Central courtyard, Turn End house
Kitchen, Turn End house
A very mid century wood panelled bathroom and three bedrooms were located behind the kitchen, accessed by a short flight of stairs. There also appeared to be a mezzanine level of sorts above both the living and home office areas, accessible via a wooden ladder.
Bedroom, Turn End house
Bedroom, Turn End house
Bedroom/Study, Turn End House
Bathroom, Turn End house
Turn End, like all of my favourite modernist houses, had a distinctly European flavour. Certain elements, such as the wooden beams and mezzanine levels reminded me of Villa Aalto in Helsinki whilst the use of exposed stone, breeze blocks and terracotta floor and roof tiles were more Mediterranean in style. With temperatures reaching 33 degrees on the day that we visited, it felt like we were in Southern Spain at times.
Living area, Turn End house
Living area, Turn End house
Mezzanine area above home office area
This was particularly the case when walking around the garden, which at just under an acre, was rather large relative to the house. Designed by Peter Adlington as a natural extension to the house, the space contained courtyards with pools, a small woodland around old apple trees and a curved glade leading to a series of garden rooms. I would love for our rather sad-looking garden to look more like this.
Garden, Turn End house
Garden, Turn End house
Garden, Turn End house
Turn End is usually open for visitors twice a year but we were told that all three houses might be open next year as a special anniversary treat. If that’s the case, I’ll definitely be coming back.
Span Blackheath 20th Century Society Tour
I recently attended another 20th Century Society architectural tour, this time an almost ludicrously comprehensive perambulation of Span developments in Blackheath. The four-and-a-half hour tour took in the full range of Span housing types, of which there was a unexpectedly wide variety.
The Priory (1956)
The Priory (1956)
Spangate (1964)
The Priory (1956), The Hall (1957), Spangate (1964) and Hallgate (1958) were examples of classic Eric Lyons-designed low-rise 1950s and 1960s apartment blocks, containing apartments filled with light (thanks to extensive glazing to the front and rear of each apartment) and looking/opening out onto perfectly maintained landscaped gardens.
The Hall (1957)
The Hall (1957)
The Hall (1957), detail
Hallgate (1958)
Hallgate (1958), detail
I’ve previously been to view an apartment in Hallgate and while I admired the setting and the development (particularly the glazed open porches and that unusual sculpture), I wasn’t overly taken with the flat itself due to the slightly tired decor inside.
The Priory (1956), interior of first floor apartment
The Priory (1956), interior of first floor apartment
The Priory (1956), interior of first floor apartment
The Priory (1956), interior of first floor apartment
The two sympathetically modernised apartments that we given access to as part of this tour (one in The Priory and the other in The Hall) were far better examples, showcasing the features of these bright spaces to their full potential.
The Hall (1957), interior of ground floor apartment
The Hall (1957), interior of ground floor apartment
The Hall (1957), interior of ground floor apartment
The Hall (1957), interior of ground floor apartment
We were also shown around some classic 1950s and 1960s Eric Lyons developments made up of two-storey terraced houses, including The Lane (1964), The Keep (1957), Hall II (1958), Corner Green (1959) and The Plantation (1962). Like the apartments in his apartment blocks, Lyons’ houses were designed to maximise the qualities of light and space and to enhance the relationship between the buildings and the surrounding landscape. Care was taken to design and build houses around existing mature trees, supplemented with new planting and the creation of communal areas that encouraged residents to mix.
Hall II (1958)
Hall II (1958)
Hall II (1958)
Some of the developments stood out as being particularly successful (for me, The Plantation and Corner Green, the latter of which was reportedly Eric Lyons’ favourite), due to their design and colour schemes coupled with the positioning of the houses around a large central open grassy space set back from the road.
The Plantation (1962)
The Plantation (1962)
Corner Green (1959)
Corner Green (1959)
Other developments, whilst equally well designed, felt slightly compromised by the size, shape and/or condition of the sites upon which they were built (the houses on The Lane, for instance, were built around a snaking tarmac drive whilst the grass and vegetation in The Keep looked like it could do with being watered in places).
The Lane (1964)
The Keep (1957)
The Keep (1957)
There were some interesting outliers along the way. The Foxes Dale Houses (1957) were a trio of larger townhouses, unusually set over three storeys with a striking spiral staircase at their centre.
Foxes Dale House (1957), exterior and back (photo from House & Garden)
Foxes Dale House (1957), interior views (photos from House & Garden)
These houses had both paved gardens to the front and rear and a balcony screened by glass and roofed by a pergola on the first floor. House & Garden were enlisted at the time to decorate these houses in seemingly flamboyant mid century style, judging by these images from the publication at the time.
Foxes Dale House (1957), interior views (photos from House & Garden)
Foxes Dale House (1957), interior views (photos from House & Garden)
Designed with a more affluent customer in mind (House & Garden referred to an imaginary retired Royal Navy commander working at Greenwich, aged about 40, married, with a son of ten), the developers apparently had a tough time shifting these houses as they were too expensive for the area at the time, which seemed to put the developers off from building any further premium housing of this type in the area.
Foxes Dale House (1957), exterior and interior views (photos from House & Garden)
Southrow (1963) also had a slightly different look and feel.
Southrow (1963)
Southrow (1963)
Southrow (1963), view from roof terrace
This development, comprised of 10 two-storey maisonettes and 23 apartments set around a large rectangular quad with one side of the development and the communal roof terrace looking out onto the heath, was also seemingly built with a more affluent customer in mind.
Southrow (1963), communal areas
Southrow (1963), roof terrace
Southrow (1963), communal areas
The houses, one of which we were given access into, originally contained a pointlessly large upstairs landing area, which the owner of this house had sensibly converted into a third bedroom and the flats, one of which we also saw inside, were extremely generously sized and quadruple aspect, with striking views from every window.
Southrow (1963), interior of Type Q maisonette
Southrow (1963), interior of Type Q maisonette
Southrow (1963), interior of second floor apartment
Southrow (1963), interior of second floor apartment
Southrow (1963), interior of second floor apartment
The 13 sand coloured terraced houses on Hall IV (1967) were another outlier. These houses had a decidedly brutalist aesthetic not seen in any other of Eric Lyons’ estates in Blackheath.
Hall IV ((1967)
Hall IV ((1967)
The tour also took us to some post-Eric Lyons Span oddities from the late 1970s and 1980s, including Streetfield Mews (1984), Corner Keep (1979) and Birchmere (1982).
Corner Keep (1979)
Streetfield Mews (1984)
Birchmere (1982)
While the use of materials and certain design choices (a weird faux Medieval typeface on the signs, red-brown Brookside-style brick, circular windows) on these estates were typical of the era, other features (seclusion from the road, immaculate landscaping and extensive glazing) were classic Span.
Note: I am certainly no Span expert so may have mis-identified any number of estates pictured above – let me know if you spot any and I will amend accordingly!
Concrete Futures architecture walking tour
I joined this RIBA walking tour last year which took me around the areas surrounding (but unfortunately not into) Balfron Tower and Robin Hood Gardens.
Robin Hood Gardens, photo courtesy of Neil Clasper Photography
The two social housing projects had been selected for the tour due to their contrasting fates: whilst Balfron Tower was undergoing a glamorous refurbishment at the time, Robin Hood Gardens was facing imminent demolition.
Balfron Tower, photo courtesy of Dezeen
Carradale House, photo courtesy of Architects Journal
Balfron Tower was designed by Ernő Goldfinger in 1963 for the London County Council. Stylistically similar to the later Trellick Tower, Balfron Tower was Grade II* listed in 1996. The refurbishment works, undertaken as a joint partnership with luxury residential developer Londonewcastle, have been going on since 2011. All properties in the tower will be sold off once the refurbishment is done with none of them going back to the social housing tenants who lived there before.
Due to the refurbishment works, the tower had been wrapped in a rather Javacheff Christo-style chrysalis on the day of the tour so it wasn’t much to look at. We had to make do with Carradale House instead, an adjacent, lower rise 11-storey building designed by Goldfinger to complement the 26-storey tower. Carradale House building had a similar look and feel to Balfron Tower with the same sky bridges and access at every third floor.
While the tour didn’t extend to going inside either building, I understand that all flats in Carradale House have dual window aspect and large south facing balconies, letting in plenty of natural light, with natural wood panels on each side.
The above pictures of Goldfinger’s former flat in Balfron Tower, which designer Wayne Hemingway restored in 2014 as part of a National Trust exhibition on brutalism (I recall trying and failing to get tickets for this) give you an idea of what the flats in Balfron Tower and Carrdale House were/are like.
The next stop on the tour was Robin Hood Gardens, or rather the remaining sections of the estate that hadn’t yet been demolished.
Robin Hood Gardens was designed in the late 1960s by architects Alison and Peter Smithson and completed in 1972. It was built as a council housing estate consisting of two long curved blocks made of precast concrete slab blocks facing each other across a central green space.
The blocks contained 213 homes connected by broad aerial walkways on every third floor (so-called “streets in the sky”) which the architects hoped would encourage interaction between residents. In addition, alcoves called “pause spaces” were provided next to the entrance doorways on the “streets” which the architects hoped the residents would personalise and where children would play. The flats themselves were a mixture of single-storey apartments and two-storey maisonettes, with two to six bedrooms.
Interior of a flat in Robin Hood Gardens (Sandra Lousada, 1972 © The Smithson Family Collection) courtesy of Municipal Dreams
Unfortunately, it transpired over the years that the design of the estate was inherently flawed. The exposed concrete slab blocks weathered poorly and the location meant that the estate was cut off from its surroundings by roads, exacerbated by its inward-facing design. The “streets in the sky” and the pause places outside the doorways were not used by the residents for their intended purpose and only served to create numerous blind spots for muggers.
Streets in the sky, Robin Hood Gardens
Visiting the remaining parts of the estate in person, it was still a very striking piece of architecture and I could see why so many renowned architects and heritage bodies campaigned against its demolition. However, it was also undeniably bleak. I was unsurprised to hear that the majority of the former residents – the people who actually had to live on the estate – supported its demolition.
In a slightly bizarre twist, the V&A Museum salvaged a large three-storey section of the estate, including the gutted interiors of a maisonette flat, sections of concrete stairway and part of an elevated walkway, on the grounds that the estate was a nationally important and internationally recognised work of Brutalist architecture. This was recently reconstructed for display in Venice.
Section of Robin Hood Gardens on display in Venice
Elephant and Castle 20th Century Society Tour
I recently attended a 20th Century Society walking tour around Elephant and Castle, taking in the various housing estates, the much maligned shopping centre and the interiors of Draper House and Metro Central Heights (aka Alexander Fleming House) by Ernö Goldfinger.
Seemingly one of the last areas in zone 1 to undergo complete regeneration, Elephant and Castle has (regrettably in my opinion) seen major change in recent years to revamp its down-at-heel, brutalist image. The 42-storey Strata tower (the one with that hideous fan thing on top) was completed in 2010, One The Elephant (another rather bland 37-storey tower) was completed in 2016 and a number of further new high rises have planning permission. The shopping centre, which has been scheduled for redevelopment for about 30 years, is apparently (finally) going to be demolished later this year.
This was where the the walking tour started. Designed by Boissevain & Osmond and opened in 1965, the shopping centre was one of the first US-style indoor shopping malls in Europe with enough space for over 100 retail units spread across on three levels surrounded by public space and incorporating the railway and tube stations. Unfortunately, it never really took off as a retail destination and fell into disrepair over the years. Walking around it on the tour, there were glimmers of the architects’ vision for a shopping centre of the future: light and airy concourses with daylight reaching deep into the building (not something that could be said of either Westfield shopping centres), neat design touches such the rainbow panelled ceiling, terrazzo marble flooring and striking red staircases.
Next on the tour was Draper House, a 25-storey tower forming part of the Draper Estate. Designed on 1958 and completed in 1963 under the principal housing architect HJ Whitfield Lewis, it was constructed with a reinforced concrete frame with pre-cast floor and cladding. We were invited in to walk across a striking if rather austere and prison-like walkway on one of the upper floors but unfortunately not inside any of the flats, which I understand to be spacious and split level in a lot of cases.
Other sights on the tour included the Lubetkin-designed Dorking House (unremarkable but for a great “1965” sign), the slightly overwhelming Symington House (a fortress of ice white and blue) and an strange pale-coloured structure (I’m not entirely sure what purpose it served – a communal seating area? Parking?) attached to a towerblock that looked an awful lot like La Villa Savoye in Poissy.
The last stop on the tour was Metro Central Heights (previously Alexander Fleming House), a vast concrete complex built between 1959 and 1967 by Hungarian-born modernist architect Ernő Goldfinger (also responsible for Trellik Tower). The multi-winged, multi-storey building (55 metres at its tallest point) housed the Department of Health and Social Security until 1989 after which it sat empty until 1997 when it was converted into around 400 residential apartments and renamed Metro Central Heights.
Alexander Fleming House, as it was
I’ve always had the impression that the conversion wasn’t particularly well executed: flats in the building that I’d seen online looked oddly proportioned and fitted with ugly late 90s kitchens and bathrooms inconsistent with the era of the building. In addition, while I can understand why they decided to freshen the original and very brutal concrete facade by painting over it, I’ve never liked the rather hospital-like white and blue colour scheme.
My negative impression of the building was mostly dispelled after the tour. The internal courtyard, with its unexpected Japanese garden was striking, the communal areas were well kept (the lift lobbies featured the original stained glass windows) and we were told that management has plans to paint the blue exterior panels a more appealing colour in the near future (the options were various shades of putty).
Unlike the ugly examples I’d previously seen online, the flat that we were invited in to see was light-filled and well-proportioned though the owner did concede that it took a while to find a flat in the building as good as this one. The Modern House currently has a similarly nice example for sale on its website.
Historical photos courtesy of a Google search…
Modernist Pilgrimage 
