I couldn’t find a guide like this online so I thought I’d compile my own based on my (so far unsuccessful) property search. Please note:

• I’ve only listed areas that seem to have an unusually high concentration of mid-century housing stock (so I haven’t included areas which feature one big mid-century housing estate if it’s an anomaly for the area)
• This is not a compilation of live listings of properties currently on the market – I’ve just tried to give an idea of the sorts of properties that exist in certain areas and that occasionally come onto the market for sale
• I’ve listed areas that are a commutable distance from central London
• This is by no means an exhaustive list and is just representative of my limited horizons – any further suggestions regarding areas I’ve missed would be very much welcome!

Dulwich

Thanks to the Dulwich Estate, there is an abundance of mid-century apartment blocks and terraced houses designed by Austin Vernon & Partners clustered in an attractive, almost wooded setting near Gipsy Hill station. Flats in the blocks, named after explorers (Drake, Raleigh, Grenville, Marlowe, Knoll, Lowood), are spacious and reasonably priced at around £425k. The houses are more expensive (around £650-750k, depending on size and design). If you’re not fussed about an architecturally significant property, there are a number of reasonably priced mid-century style housing developments and apartment blocks about (see Linley Court).

A house in Lings Coppice, a 1960s housing development near West Dulwich station, is about £800k. Though small, the houses are very characterful with a rather special double height/void. Houses in the Peckarman’s Wood development nearby are possibly even more spectacular but very rarely come up for sale.

The elegant Park Court in nearby Penge is also worth a look. Two bedroom flats go for between £400-425k depending on condition (prices here have remained static for a couple of years).

Highgate/Archway

Highgate is resplendent with beautiful mid-century houses but these are only for people with several million to spend. A flat in one of the numerous mid-century apartment blocks are slightly more affordable – there are quite a few along Shepherds Hill. The nicest flats can be found in Highpoint, which start from around £700k but have a £15k in annual maintenance fee attached.

Archway is home to Stoneleigh Terrace, a renowned designed modernist estate. I’m pretty sure that the construction of these flats means that it’s difficult to take out a mortgage to buy one but when they do come on the market, they’re around £400k for a one bedroom, £525k for a two bedroom split level maisonette and around £700k for the larger house-style properties.

Forest Hill

I think I’ve pretty much covered everything that Forest Hill has to offer from a mid-century housing perspective in previous blog entries! There are lots of mid century terraces including some nice Norman Starrett-designed ones (prices range from around 450k for a little two bedroom house to £750k for something more substantial) and a smattering of apartment blocks around the Hyndewood area (£350-375k).

There’s also one of those Austin Vernon & Partners-designed apartment blocks (at £500-525k, the flats in Frobisher Court are a lot more expensive than identical flats in Gipsy Hill and I’m not entirely sure why).

Chislehurst

I don’t know much about Chislehurst, an affluent-looking residential area slightly to the south and east than the more popular Blackheath. It does, however, seem to contain a high concentration of attractive mid-century houses, including this incredible Norman Starrett estate (there’s a house currently on the market which looks like a deluxe version of the Norman Starrett houses that we’ve been to see in Forest Hill) and some handsome detached properties. There seems to be less in the way of mid century apartment blocks or estates. Prices for the houses seem to range from £850k to upwards of £1.5million.

Ham, Richmond

I really like what I’ve seen of Ham and would consider moving there if the transport links improved (it’s serviced by buses only with the nearest rail links over a mile away). There’s the large Eric Lyons-designed Parkleys Span estate (around £400-425k for a two bedroom flat) and the even nicer Langham House Close just by the common (around £475k for a two bedroom flat). There are also some nice enough mid-century-style houses at around the £550-£650k mark, which seems like decent value.

Weybridge

An episode of Location Location Location brought Weybridge to my attention as an area with a decent amount of mid-century housing in the form of apartment blocks (including the charmingly ugly Stroudwater Park) and some great houses.

Amongst the best houses are those at Templemere, a rather stunning Eric Lyons-designed housing development (much larger and bolder than the average Span estate). Prices seem quite reasonable for an area that I’ve always associated with being a very pricey commuter town (around £350-400k for a 2 bedroom flat and £600-750k for one of the more modest mid-century houses).

Beckenham

One of the biggest revelations for me during my property search has been this unassuming south east London district next to Croydon. One of the first properties I came across was Blair Court, a rather stunning modernist housing development.

This wasn’t the only property of this type in the area- there appears to be plenty of other developments, one-off houses and unusual apartment blocks, including the outlandishly designed Apex Close. Prices are around £500-750k for a house and around £350-400k for a two bedroom flat.

Blackheath

Blackheath is home to possibly the most centrally located and priciest Eric Lyons-designed Span estate. The estate really is massive and contains multiple apartment blocks and houses in different styles and sizes. The most desirable Span properties are the larger T15 type houses (around £900k) and the flats in the South Row block, on the southern side of the heath overlooking the water (£550k for a two bedroom flat). Aside from Span properties, I’ve come across a number of slightly more nondescript mid-century terraced houses (around £550-650k).

Images sourced from property agent sites (including The Modern House), Modernist Estates, WowHaus and a Google image search 

London Road, Forest Hill SE23
1960s terraced house opposite Horniman Museum
Architect: Unknown to me
Year built: 1960s

We recommenced our property search later in the year by going to see a couple of places including this 1960s house opposite the Horniman Museum in Forest Hill.

Having passed this row of houses a couple of times, I thought they were interesting-looking with their funny boxed-in front gardens and brightly coloured panels. The location appeared to be convenient as well, being a short walk away from the station, the grounds of the Horniman museum and other local amenities. I’d seen a couple of the houses come up for sale in the past but they seemed really expensive compared to other houses in Forest Hill – I recall one in slightly dodgy condition being listed at something around £750k – so they never seemed to be a realistic option. With Brexit hitting London property prices, however, a house in the middle of the terrace came up for sale at still expensive but slightly less extortionate £700k so I thought it was worth having a look.

The house was in vacant but acceptable condition, showing signs of a hasty post-tenant redecoration job. Upon entering through the walled and gated garden, which felt a bit like a cage, you were met with a small hallway which led into the main living area. This was a great space, both wide and deep, stretching to the back of the house and overlooking a decent garden. There was an actual mid-century fireplace on one wall (though the original exposed brick wall that I’ve seen in other examples of these houses had been plastered over) and the original parquet floor was in decent condition.

A separate, decent sized but drably refitted kitchen led off the main living area and oddly contained a door which went out into the caged front garden (giving the front facade of the house two front doors). Upstairs were three bedrooms and a bathroom. A further flight of stairs led up to another bedroom, which was decently proportioned considering it was tucked between the eaves of the house.

Although the house was a good size and had some really nice features, it wasn’t without its issues. It contained a hot air heating system (dry, inefficient, expensive to replace and annoyingly common in mid century properties), the convenient location meant there was quite a bit of road noise (possibly fixable with new double glazing) and a lot of the original features, such as the natural timber balustrades had been painted over with a coat of generic white gloss paint. As such, despite its potential, £700k still seemed expensive.

EDIT: I’ve just realised that this house, which is in my starred Air bnb wishlist, is in this terrace! The owners have done a great renovation job on it.

 

Hyndewood, Forest Hill SE23
Norman Starrett-designed 1960s terraced house
Architect: Norman Starrett
Year built: 1964

I really liked this house that we saw a couple of months ago. Slightly different in design to the other Norman Starrett house in Forest Hill that we previously went to see (which I also liked), this one was part of a smaller terrace of eight two-storey houses built in the mid-1960s for the Hyndewood development company.

While the house was very charming and characterful, it was also (with all due respect to the very nice and stylish sellers) a little rough around the edges. The facade and front garden had a slightly ramshackle feel which continued throughout the house and into the slightly overgrown back garden. However, no amount of crumbling woodwork and peeling paint could detract from wealth of original 1960s features, open layout and overall potential.

The ground floor of the house consisted of an expansive open-plan living space, which stretched into a glass extension and the garden to the rear. There was a refitted galley kitchen at the front of the house, separated from the living area by a breakfast bar, as per the house’s original design.

The open-tread stairs (one of my favourite midcentury features) led to a landing on the first floor and three bedrooms. There was also a large bathroom, previously a separate bathroom and toilet that had been knocked into one room. Although it had no external walls, a skylight which almost ran the length of the ceiling flooded the room with light.

As this article from Midcentury Magazine demonstrates, these houses have the potential to look amazing and this particular house had the advantage of being in an almost original, untouched state. The price wasn’t too bad either – if I recall correctly, it was listed at around the £635k mark. However, the potential number of issues and amount of work that would have been necessary to fix it up dissuaded is from making an offer. It went under offer the next week though so someone obviously saw its potential.

Hoover Building, Perivale UB6
Converted Grade II* listed Art Deco factory building
Architect: Wallis, Gilbert and Partners
Year built: 1933-1938

Despite not being a particular fan of Art Deco and having no particular desire to relocate to Perivale, West London, I was sufficiently convinced by the slick marketing materials for flats in the converted Gilbert and Partners-designed Hoover Building to trek across London to attend the open day.

The Hoover building was built for the Hoover Company in 1933 and was used as a factory until the 1980s at which point it was sold on (though thankfully not before receiving a Grade II* listing), some of it to Tesco, which explains why there’s an unusually Art Deco-styled Tesco superstore and car park to the rear of the site.

Come 2017, IDM bought up the front section of the main building to convert into “luxury” flats with the intention of salvaging and reusing as many of the original Art Deco features as possible throughout the building in order to retain the ‘full glory of the stunning architectural treasure’ (to quote the marketing materials).

The redevelopment was only partially complete on the open day. The exterior of the building was a striking Art Deco fortress of white walls and green-framed Crittall windows – as were the communal areas and rather dramatic staircases.

The flats themselves were a mixed bag. One of the main problems that I usually have with conversions of any kind is the tendency for them to have irregular floorplans, oddly placed/sized windows and weirdly proportioned rooms. The first flat featured all of these pet peeves: it had two bedrooms (one with a high window which looked out onto nothing and so had been fitted with an frosted pane) and an irregularly shaped open plan living area with yet more completely frosted windows and a random raised area (probably housing some pipes or something) by an actual window which looked out onto that busy road.

The second flat was much more attractive but this too had a strange layout. Upon entering, you ascended a flight of stairs to a landing area which led to one of the bedrooms, the bathroom and the living room (which opened out onto a generously sized terrace).

The second bedroom was accessed via a spiral staircase in the middle of the landing area. This bedroom had its own ensuite and a second terrace which could only be accessed by crawling through a waist-height window. This particular flat had been dressed to the nines in a sort of old Hollywood Art Deco style which gave me American Horror Story: Hotel vibes – probably not the intended effect.

The flats were reasonably affordable but all of the ones with decent floorplans had already been reserved off plan (including all of the ones resembling the second show flat). As such, a move to Perivale is not on the cards.

Du Cane Court, Balham SW12
Art Deco apartment block
Architect: G. Kay Green
Year built: 1935-1938

Du Cane Court is a distinctive 1930s Art Deco block on Balham High Road. Reportedly the largest privately owned block of flats under one roof in Europe, its distinctive footprint was used as a navigational landmark by German pilots bombing London during the Second World War and was also a popular place to live for many music hall stars in the 1930s and 1940s.

I’ve never been a huge fan of Art Deco as I find the aesthetic a bit too fussy and vintagey but Du Cane Court is such an iconic block in such a convenient location that when two flats came up for sale in my price range last year, I was intrigued enough to want to view them.

First impressions were good. The block, vast and uniform, looked imposing from the road and was complemented by some attractive Japanese-style landscaping. The glamorous if slightly kitschy communal lobby was like something out of a Agatha Christie novel set in the 1930s with period furnishings, a lot of curved surfaces, pillars and gold accents.

The first flat that I saw was a 2 bedroom flat on one of the lower floors of the building, accessed via a very long carpeted corridor. Like a lot of flats from this era, it had a lateral layout with all of the rooms lined up in a row, accessed via one long corridor down the side.

The combination of layout and the fact it was on a low floor meant that the flat felt a bit dark. Looking out of the windows into the internal courtyard and the hundreds of other flats in the block (all of the rooms had the same outlook given the lateral layout) wasn’t for me.

The other flat was a self contained split-level maisonette with its own front door accessed via the side of the block. This was better but there was something odd about the way it had been converted and renovated, particularly the downstairs kitchen and living area which was sort of open plan but sort of not. The existing owner had decorated in a way that was sympathetic to the era but the flat wasn’t quite to my taste overall.

I’ve since seen a really nice example of a one bedroom flat in the block on the Modern House website. The vendor had done a very high-spec all-white renovation job, which gave the place a far more contemporary (yet still fitting) look.

Hyndewood, Forest Hill, SE23
Mid-century extended end of terrace house
Architect: Norman Starrett
Year built: 1950s-1960s

Due to a happy change of circumstances, I’ve changed the focus of my longstanding property search from a modernist property for one to a modernist property for two.

I’ve always quite liked Forest Hill as an area – it’s commutable into the city, it has nice green spaces (including the Horniman Museum gardens with that fantastic view across to the city and Dawsons Heights), the amenities are decent with a nice mix of pointless artisan and essential shops and most importantly, it has a fair amount of nice mid century modern housing stock, including one of those Austin Vernon and partners blocks that I went to see last year and rows of less well known but still interesting-looking terraced houses.

This house was at the end of a Norman Starrett-designed terrace down a very quiet little close containing a cluster of mid century houses and flats. It looked enormous from the floorplan due to a ground floor extension on the side of the house and appeared to have retained a lot of original 1960s features, including a very stylised kitchen and a lot of wood panelling.

In person, the house was even perhaps bigger than I was expecting it to be. The amount of floor space on the ground floor alone was probably bigger than a lot of two bedroom flats in London that I’ve seen, containing two adjoining reception rooms (both with original parquet flooring), that very retro kitchen, a utility room and a downstairs bathroom. Patio doors led out onto a small paved garden.

Upstairs were three bedrooms (two double, one single) and a further bathroom (this one with a very period avocado suite) and another bedroom up a further flight of stairs at the top of the house.

The seller was an elderly lady who had lived in the flat for over thirty years and while she clearly hadn’t updated anything during that period, she had maintained everything pretty well, which meant that the house was a nicely preserved time capsule. With a small amount of cosmetic updating (repainting the walls, replacing the carpets upstairs and probably that avocado bathroom) and a bit of good mid century furniture, the house would have been absolutely beautiful.

The house was also quite keenly priced at £600k, a decision on the seller and agent’s part to get as many offers as possible (most likely over the asking price), allowing for the property to be sold as soon as possible. We didn’t end up putting in an offer as the timing wasn’t quite right (and we had a fair amount of competition from other buyers) but this house will certainly serve as a benchmark for the purposes of our property search going forward.

Church Garth, Pemberton Gardens N19
Mid-century apartment block
Architect: Unknown to me
Year built: 1960s

I have been intrigued by this 1960s apartment block in Archway ever since I saw it featured in an episode of Location, Location, Location a couple of years ago. The episode featured a nice thirty-something, creative couple seeking a 2 bedroom flat in London for about £300k (this must have been more than five years ago because that figure seems ridiculous now). The flat they ended up buying was really attractive with a good, logical layout (a nice big hall with decently proportioned rooms branching off it), parquet flooring, a balcony and lots of natural light.

Five or so years down the line, a 2 bedroom flat came in the block came onto the market at £485k. Given the state of the ridiculously inflated market, I actually thought this was a very reasonable price for the area and went to have a look.

The exterior of the building, the garden and thecommunal areas were exactly how I remembered them from the programme: 1960s-looking but not overly stylised. The location was also very good: about two minutes’ walk from the tube and on an attractive residential street opposite a church (probably how it got its name).

Unfortunately, the flat itself was not great. While it was very bright, with light coming in from two sides, it had a different layout to the one featured on Location, Location, Location, with an L-shaped corridor as a hall, a long narrow kitchen and a small second bedroom. The kitchen and bathroom needed replacing, everything needed repainting (and possibly replastering in places) and it was stuffed to the gills with the current tenants’ belongings (the living room was being used as a third bedroom).

I didn’t take any photos because it would have been too intrusive to do so but I did find some photos online of a recently renovated version of the same flat which sold for £515k:

Looking at these photos, it’s difficult to believe it’s basically the same flat as the one I saw today – given the choice between the two, I think I would pay an extra 30k for all of that work to have been done by the time I moved in.

I’m going to continue to keep an eye on the block to see if something slightly less decrepit than the one I saw comes onto the market.

 

Trevelyan House, Bethnal Green EC2
Grade II-listed apartment block
Architect: Denys Lasdun
Year built: 1958

Although I was a bit underwhelmed by the flat I saw in Keeling House last year (in summary, I loved the building but found the refurbished communal areas a bit naff and the flat itself a bit cramped and expensive), I was very intrigued when a flat came up for sale in Trevelyan House, Denys Lasdun’s original brutalist “cluster block” in Bethnal Green.

Trevelyan House and nearby Sulkin House have the same innovative design and build as their more glamorous younger sibling: the 24 flats are arranged in three separate eight-storey blocks which form a butterfly shape around a central core containing the lift and stairwells. This layout means that only three flats share a communal landing (rather than dozens of flats sharing a long communal walkway) and the flats get plenty of light from several sides.

Like Keeling House, Trevelyan House is constructed from reinforced concrete and brick and has a similarly striking aesthetic. Although the block was Grade II-listed in 1998, the original steel windows were replaced at some point with cheap-looking uPVC and the fact that the block is still used as social housing means that it isn’t quite as well maintained as Keeling House, which was converted into a “luxury” development in the early 2000s. There is no flashy lobby and concierge here: once you get past the main gate, the communal areas are as no-frills as they come.

The flat on the market that we viewed was a two bedroom, split-level maisonette on the second and third floors of the block. Layout-wise, it was very similar to the one that I saw in Keeling House with the living room, balcony and kitchen on the lower floor and the bedrooms and bathroom on the upper floor.

Despite the dated decor and aforementioned uPVC windows, I actually thought the flat was superior in a number of ways to the one in Keeling House. It seemed to be larger for starters: whilst the Keeling House flat squeezed a compact open plan kitchen into the living room; the Trevelyan House had a similarly sized living room and a decently sized separate kitchen in addition.

Upstairs, the landing area, bedrooms and bathroom also appeared to be slightly more generously sized in the Trevelyan House flat. In addition, the views from the balcony and windows of the Trevelyan House flat were better (not that you could see anything through the yellowing net curtains). The key difference that made the Trevelyan House flat more appealing, however, was the price. Whilst hardly cheap at £435,000 for an ex local authority flat “requiring modernisation”, it was more than £150,000 cheaper than the Keeling House flat.

This beautifully remodelled but otherwise identical flat that I found online gives an idea of what can be achieved with the space with a bit of structural work (the bulk of the effort appears to have gone into reconfiguring the kitchen into a cube which opens out into the main living area).

The work cost £80,000 which means that if I bought the flat that we viewed and renovated it to a similar standard, it would work out as being significantly cheaper than buying a decrepit flat in Keeling House. Unfortunately I came to the decision that I wasn’t ready for such a big project and passed on making an offer (though if the remodelled one came onto the market, that would be a very different story).

Linley Court, Dulwich SE19
Mid-century apartment block
Architect: Unknown to me
Year built: 1950s-1960s

I went to see a flat in Linley Court last year after my third attempt at buying a flat in the Dulwich Wood Estate fell through (as an aside, that flat has just come back onto the market, now with an extended lease but £50k more expensive than the price at the time). Located just a few streets away and 1960s-looking in style, Linley Court seemed like the next best thing at the time.

Set back from the road in a leafy close, one of the best things about Linley Court was the picturesque, almost Disney-esque setting. The block itself, which appeared to be part of a small development of flats and three-storey townhouses clad in rather Span-like terracotta tiling, was less remarkable but nice-looking enough.

The flat was split over two floors and unusually large with three bedrooms and a separate utility room off the kitchen (a luxury almost completely unheard of in London flats). Whilst it wasn’t nearly as striking as the flat I’d attempted to buy on the Dulwich Wood Estate, the living space was generous, light-filled and dual aspect. I also liked some of some of the original features, such as the built-in wooden shelving unit separating the kitchen and living area.

I can’t really remember why I didn’t end up making an offer on this flat. Writing about it now, I remember actually quite liking it at the time! It may have been the price, which was around £500k, which seemed like quite a lot for the area and significantly more expensive than the flat that I’d missed out on.

Keeling House, Bethnal Green E2
Grade II listed apartment block
Architect: Denys Lasdun
Year built: 1954-1957

I’ve always liked the idea of living in Keeling House: it is, in my opinion, one of the best looking modernist tower blocks in London and handily, its Bethnal Green location would be within walking distance of the office. As a result, I jumped at the chance at viewing one of the flats when it came onto the market earlier this year as part of my ill-fated property search.

Whilst first impressions of the area immediately surrounding Keeling House weren’t overwhelmingly positive, the exterior of building did not disappoint. Originally built between 1954 and 1957, Denys Lasdun’s design for Keeling House shunned the traditional slab block in favour of an unusual winged plan (four blocks arranged around a central service tower), giving the building the appearance of a futuristic concrete windmill. The winged plan also means that there are only four flats per communal stairwell, originally designed to encourage the occupants of the flats to interact with each other.

The communal areas were renovated in 2001 when the building was converted from social housing into a block of luxury flats. I think the architects, Munkenbeck + Marshall, may have gone a bit overboard with this task when it came to the downstairs lobby: the bridge, trickling water features and stone sculptures simultaneously evoke a Pierce Brosnan-era James Bond film and a corporate waiting room. I thought it was all a bit unnecessary and definitely not in keeping with the period of the original architecture.

The flat that I was viewing was a split-level 2-bed occupying the second and third floors of the building. Apart from the ground floor flats and the penthouse that Munkenbeck + Marshall tacked onto the top of the building, I understand that all of the flats have the same layout. The lower floor of the flat consisted of an open plan living area and kitchen with a balcony and the upper floor contained the bedrooms and (very small) bathroom.

I must say I was slightly underwhelmed by the flat, which felt a little cramped and tired. The bathroom suite and admittedly well designed and attractive kitchen units (built into recesses in the walls to save space) clearly hadn’t been updated since 2001 and there was a distinct lack of storage, particularly when it came to the bedrooms. The outlook wasn’t fantastic either (other estates or the tops of other estates) though a flat on one of the higher floors would probably have been much better in this regard.

At the original £600k asking price, I wouldn’t have had any funds left to restore it to its former glory though I understand the seller may have since accepted an offer at around £580k.