FOLAR
Friends of the Landscape Archive at Reading

Castles in the Air? Landscapes and gardens of public housing

Friends of the Landscape Archive at Reading

Castles in the air? Aspirations and realities of post
war housing and their gardens and landscapes

Five online recorded talks produced by FOLAR and The Gardens Trust, May-June 2023

With a brilliant band of speakers - Dr Catherine Flinn, Luis Diaz, John Boughton, Dr Jan Woudstra and associate professor, Otto Saumarez Smith, these talks span from broad post war politics, the problems of getting UK redeveloped and who held the strings in Whitehall, to a brief history of social housing and the evolving forms and layouts of council estates; there will be details about individual estates, including some contrasting examples from the Netherlands, and what works and what has endured. Influences of the garden city movement will weave its way through the talks, also high rise and low rise, and creating or recreating neighbourhoods. The development of the third wave of the New Towns reveals much about changing social and political attitudes, mobility and the impact of a declining heavy industrial base. What can we learn from all this to help make our new housing better?

1. Hopeful Dreams, Stark Realities

The postwar built environment in Britain, for the past thirty years, has been condemned mainly as a failure. This perception of failure looms especially large in light of the yawning gap between what was hoped for and what was realized. The rhetoric of blame, for the loss of beauty and even ‘Britishness’ in the rebuilt blitzed cities, has focused on planners and architects. But comments like those above ignore evidence about the background in which this built environment was created. Perspectives are too often shaped by recent biases and values rather than historic context. During and after the Second World War those who wrote and planned for the future focused on hope and potential, publishing modernist visions of new city centres. This talk will focus on how planning for reconstruction was approached, the factors that inhibited realisation of plans, and the realities faced by blitzed cities in postwar Britain.

Catherine Flinn has a doctorate in modern British history and is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. She previously took degrees in landscape architecture, architectural history and garden history and conservation. She returned to academia following a professional career in architecture, landscape and planning. Dr Flinn has taught at several universities in the US and the UK. Her research focuses on postwar reconstruction - in particular the political, economic and social impacts of rebuilding and redevelopment. Her book “Rebuilding Britain’s Blitzed Cities: Hopeful Dreams, Stark Realities” was published by Bloomsbury and is available in paperback.