Starts:
11:00am, Sunday, 29 September 2019
Until:
01:00pm, Sunday, 29 September 2019
Tour Guides:
Ian McInnes
Tickets: £15 Standard // AF Members and Supporters can receive 20% Discount with code
Duration: 2.5 hrs
Start: Meet outside Brixton Recreation Centre, 27 Brixton Station Rd, Brixton, London SW9 8QQ
Contact: 07891901230
Getting There: Brixton underground station
Under the charismatic leadership of borough architect Ted Hollamby, the London Borough of Lambeth’s Architect’s Department designed and built a large number of award-winning housing projects through the 1960s, 1970s and into the 1980s. He, and his team, were adamant that social housing tenants were entitled to good quality homes and that it was possible to provide them at a high density, generally without the need to build high. They were particularly interested in a contextual approach where new building was integrated within the existing townscape and reflected the local character.
Starting in Brixton with the recently listed Brixton Rec, we visit the iconic Southwyck House (aka the barrier block) designed in response to the inner London motorway box, and the Moorlands Estate behind it. We then move on to a series of low-rise estates which demonstrate different approaches to achieving high density living using a range of typologies, built predominantly in stock brickwork. These include the Radburn inspired Blenheim Gardens, the intricate pedestrian focused courtyard house layout of Virginia Walk and Cherry Laurel Walk, and the heavily landscaped Cressingham Gardens Estate overlooking Brockwell Park, perhaps the best of all Lambeth’s schemes.
Tour Guide:
Ian McInnes
Ian McInnes leads architecture tours for a number of organisations. He is an architect and a former chair of the Twentieth Century Society’s Casework Committee. He lives locally and has a particular interest in both private and social housing from this period.