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Our house in the middle of our street
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Our house in the middle of our street
Location: Tower Hamlets
The words ‘Built Heritage’ tend to conjure up visions of cathedrals, stately homes and grand architectural masterpieces, however the term is just as relevant to the structures which surround us in our daily lives, including our homes.
Walking around the local area, how closely do we look at the buildings which form the backdrop to our daily lives? My local area is a 1930s development of five blocks of flats, with gardens, garages and a clubhouse.
Discovering its real history involved peeling away layers of mythology which have been exaggerated by estate agents since the flats were put on the open market in the 1980s.
“It was built for the film stars working at the local studios,” they say.
In fact it was built for the people who worked at the studios in the technical support roles and a few minor actors lived here too while the stars stayed at the Ritz.
There were stories about a bowling green which no longer exists and wild parties in the 1950s. Were the gardens dug up to grow vegetables during the war? Was a Volkswagen Beetle really driven into the pool in the 1960s? We didn’t really know.
Fortunately two women who were born in the ‘Village’ in the 1930s and lived there throughout the 1940s and 1950s shared their memories with the residents’ association. Their pre-war photographs showed the bowling green, the original enclosed concrete fire escapes (where they would hide with their boyfriends), the pool’s diving board and a greenhouse which no-one remembered. They described the railings and gates, taken for the ‘war effort’ and never replaced.
As for the mysterious concrete structures, they were put there in the 1940s to block the entrances to the air raid shelters and stop the children using them as play areas. Our ‘Village’ veterans recalled life in an exclusive place during the 30s with modern luxuries, two uniformed porters and a gentleman to open the gates for the few motor vehicles which visited. What is now our bike shed was originally a WWII ‘pillbox’ which looked over the railway line out of Paddington Station.
The Local Heritage Initiative funded The Austin Village project, built to house munitions workers at Longbridge, Birmingham in World War I, when residents decided to explore their own heritage.
The Lansbury Estate was built for the 1951 Festival of Britain to celebrate a new start after the austerity of the war years. Now it is a deprived area, despite the high hopes of the original planners. The Lansbury 2001 project celebrated their 50th anniversary with a 1951 dance, a community festival, art exhibitions, carnivals and a festival history book, involving the community in history classes and collecting photographs and reminiscences.
At the opposite end of the time-scale, residents in Hylton , Sunderland, look out of their front windows at the unusual sight of a medieval tower and gatehouse, Hylton Dene. The local Friends group received LHI funding to carry out archaeological investigations, hold public events and produce printed and online information.
Sarah McCartney
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