Wigan Civic Centre 2026

Posted on by modernmoocher

Over ten years ago I visited Wigan Civic Centre.

It looked a lot like this:

The current Pevsner Guide remarks:

1971 built of a pre-cast concrete panel system, dour, on an awkwardly sloping site.

I beg to differ – what’s the opposite of dour?

So says the online Thesaurus – and I heartily concur, for the whole building has had a makeover and a half.

Civic is a super energy-efficient workspace in the centre of Wigan town centre. The BREEAM Excellent building has space for business of all sizes, from desks for solo start-ups, all the way to big open plan offices with their own front door.

The brutalist beast has been lovingly restored by Capital&Centric to celebrate its architecture, with original waffle ceilings, corduroy concrete and stunning feature windows that flood the space with light.

Capital&Centric

The redevelopment was supported by cash from the UK Shared Prosperity Fund – UKSPF.

Dave Molyneux, the leader of Wigan Council, said:

I had an office in here for quite a while and it had that 1970s retro, concrete building style but this is something special. 

For businesses, we’re probably the best located local authority in Greater Manchester because of the West Coast Main Line and the M6 motorway.

BBC

It was great to visit and tour Wigan Civic Centre on Millgate, to see the inspiring work being done to create sustainable workspaces and amenities in the centre of our town. This development, alongside others taking place and planned across the North West, will help to revitalise our public spaces

Lisa Nandy MP

The refit was handled by shedkm.

With students, start-ups and professionals situating themselves elsewhere in Greater Manchester, Wigan town had been missing out on the economic and cultural vitality that high quality workspace brings. Civic’s transformation represents not just the overhaul of a tired concrete building, but a wider renewal of place and opportunity for Wigan.

Main interior contractors were Workspace Design & Build.

Working with Wigan Council and Capital & Centric, we completed the refurbishment of the 50,000 sq ft building that is Wigan Civic Centre. Delivering aspirational office accommodation to stimulate economic growth with the goal to create a lasting social impact in Wigan. In addition to exemplar market-leading workspace, amenities include a rooftop terrace, mini cinema, gym studio and co-working/coffee shop space.

Here’s the exterior.

Many thanks to the Cotton Café Bar for kindly allowing us in after hours.

Diners image Canning O’Neill – spaces to let.

Ultimately, civic stands as a symbol of optimism for Wigan, proving that intelligent commercial design can catalyse economic renewal, secure a sustainable future, and truly lift a town’s spirits, without erasing its history. It is a gold standard for the adaptive reuse of 20th-century landmarks.

Judge, BCO Awards 2026

Open for business bob along pronto.

Shore Road Poole

Posted on by modernmoocher

I was wandering lonely from Bournemouth to Poole, one sunny day in May, when all at once I came upon a road – Shore Road.

Shore Road is adjacent to Sandbanks.

Sandbanks is an affluent neighbourhood of Poole, situated on a narrow spit extending into the mouth of Poole Harbour.

It is known for its high property prices and for its award-winning beach.

 In 2005, Sandbanks was reported to have the fourth highest land value by area in the world.

Wikipedia

Zoopla

Shore Road is by comparison a poor relation.

House prices in Shore Road have an overall average of £1,150,000 over the last year.

Overall, the historical sold prices in Shore Road over the last year were 35% up on the previous year and 44% down on the 2019 peak of £2,055,238.

Right Move

So much for the cost, but what about the value?

To begin at the middle, the middle of the Twentieth Century, houses may have looked like this:

Or possibly these:

These Shore Road survivors have resisted the charm of redevelopment, the demolition and new build, or the uPVC over cladding, relentless render or reglaze.

So what happened to houses that look like houses?

This upwardly mobile trend, fuelled by the rakish progress on the so called property ladder, fanned by 80’s Thatcherite tax cuts, and the ever so irresistible allure of conspicuous consumption.

Architectural historian Virginia Savage McAlester, coined the term Millennium Mansion, though these houses are also referred to as a McMansion, Persian Palace, Garage Mahal, Starter Castle, and Hummer House.

Marketing parlance often uses the term tract mansions or executive homes.

Let’s take a closer look at the look of luxury, is it playful and witty pastiche or Post Modern mumbo jumbo – un repas de chien.

If you liked this, then you may like this North Foreland Estate.

Y’all come back now!

Barclays House – Poole

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Barclays House 1 Wimborne Road 

Photo 2012 – Peter Holmes

Barclays House was constructed by Barclays bank from 1972 to 1975 as part of a move to decentralise its offices from London.

The structure, was designed in the Brutalist style by architects Wilson, Mason and Partners. It consists of three main wings, each octagonal in plan, and dominates the town centre skyline.

Barclays first occupied the office in January 1976. The building’s basement is below sea level and is often flooded or damp, which prevented its use by the bank for storage. The structure has also sunk over time due to its significant mass

Barclays left the site in January 2022 and put the structure up for sale by sealed bid auction. The highest bidder was Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council but they withdrew from the purchase in September 2022.

BCP offered £17 million, almost three times more than the next highest bidder, thought to be Fortitudo at £6.5 million, who wanted to demolish the structure and build three apartment towers.

In February 2023, boarding was put up around the building and the Bournemouth Daily Echo reported that a new buyer had been found. In November 2023, proposals for redevelopment to residential use were announced, 362 flats are proposed for the building.

Wikipedia

The main reception 28th January 1976.

Historic England

Photos 26th March 2025 – AD Coastalmedia

Town hall planner Gareth Ball has given the go-ahead for VCRE Four Poole Limited to convert the historic building into a 362-bedroom apartment block. 

No parking spaces will be available for the future residents, as noted by BCP case officer Mr Ball as being in accordance with the council’s rules. Instead, the development will come with 488 cycle spaces – or one space for every resident. The scheme will feature a gym, communal workspace, squash courts, a games room with table tennis, pool, video games, surfboard storage and a rooftop garden.

Barclays House was bought last year for £5.3 million, according to documents. 

Bournemouth Echo

Here are the photographs I took in May 2026 – incorporating the multi storey car park.

But what of the future?

This recent ARC project involves transforming the former Barclays building in Poole into 362 modern residential flats while preserving the existing building’s façade. This project focuses on revitalising a heritage landmark by repurposing it with innovative designs that offer easy access to public transport, exceed space standards for comfort and practicality, and create a strong sense of community through shared internal and external amenities.

Avenue Road Car Park – Bournemouth

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Avenue Road Bournemouth BH2 5SL

After twenty years, the waterproofing on the top deck of the busy Avenue Road council car park in Bournemouth was failing. Water was penetrating the structure and dripping onto users’ cars on the lower levels and also into a tenant’s offices situated below. More importantly, this was affecting the structural integrity of the car park.

Being close to the sea, the car park is subjected to highly corrosive moisture and salt levels, which if left unprotected could cause long term structural damage. And indeed, further investigation by the contractors Concrete Repairs Ltd. and Triflex’s Technical Team revealed that part of the concrete substrate was cracking and failing causing potential health and safety issues.

As a result, the council needed to refurbish the car park and have a reliable waterproofing solution that would extend the car park’s service life. In addition, this work needed to be finished before the start of the busy summer tourist period.

Concrete Repairs Ltd. and the Triflex Technical Team visited the site to complete an extensive site survey. Testing was also conducted to determine the suitability and compatibility of the substrate and the requirements for its preparation. Triflex DeckFloor was specified for the decks with DeckFloor Ramp System to provide a more aggressive aggregate was to the ramps and inclined areas of the car park. The ramp system incorporates emery aggregate which provides additional traction for those harder wearing areas.

Triflex

Consequently when I arrived at the car park’s higher level, the surfaces were crisp and clear, providing an angular geometry for this eager snapper.

The third car park of a four day stay here on the South Coast, having previously visited both Bournemouth’s Glen Fern and Shoppers in Poole.

So having ascended the California screen block lined stairway, I wandered the wide open spaces, alone with my thoughts and camera.

Shoppers Car Park – Poole

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Serpentine Lane Poole BH15 United Kingdom

Always a pleasure to walk the spiral ramp of a multi-storey car park, with the extra added pleasure of a passing motorist enquiring after my well being.

“Are You Lost?”

“No I’m taking pictures, but thanks anyway, if I ever am lost I’ll certainly know who to ask.”

Glen Fern Car Park – Bournemouth

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5 Glen Fern Road Bournemouth BH1 2LZ

Something of an anomaly, combining accommodation with a leisure facility.

The Outlook is ideally suited to students looking for quality, self catering, en suite accommodation in central Bournemouth, just a minute’s walk from the town’s excellent amenities.

The student accommodation has recently completed a comprehensive refurbishment, the work which included considerable redesign, new furnishings and decoration.

Why don’t you take a look at the accommodation and find out more about our excellent location.

The Outlook

Excitingly close to Oasis Fun Bournemouth’s No.1 indoor fun centre.

Want to keep the kids entertained?

Then why not visit Oasis Fun today for a fun-filled experience for the whole family. We have an amazing bowling alley with six lanes, an indoor soft play centre, large Adventure Golf course, arcades and pool tables. Oh, and we have a café serving snacks and a fully licensed bar.

Oasis Fun

Though ARC Architecture have other plans for the site.

As of May 2026 the car park and Outlook were still very much in use.

Scarborough Housing

Posted on by modernmoocher

It’s 1892 and the Twentieth Century is about to overwrite the expansive green sward of Northstead and Newlands.

The Manor of Northstead consisted of a medieval manor house surrounded by fields and farms in the parish of Scalby in the North Riding of Yorkshire. The estate originally bordered the northern side of the ancient boundary of the Borough of Scarborough, following the line of Peasholm Beck. The estate passed into the ownership of the Crown during the reign of King Richard III. By 1600, the manor house had fallen into disrepair, being latterly occupied by Sir Richard Cholmeley’s shepherd until it finally collapsed

Wikipedia

Fast forward to 1939 and the building has begun.

Britain from Above

And here we are today give a take a day or two.

Walking the streets on a sunny Scarborough day, I was struck by the capricious cornucopia of interwar and postwar architectural styles. These are well kept well behaved homes, many of which were built as imposing apartment blocks, possibly for the seaside retirees, or the transient tourist.

The coast encourages a playful sense of design, referencing vernacular styles and including several decorative devices.

So let’s take a wander around, see what we can see.

It is with deepest regret that despite the best efforts of everyone involved, it has now been confirmed that Lynwood Convalescent Home will close at the end of 2025. Whilst it was previously hoped that Lynwood could remain open for a further period, unfortunately, there are insufficient funds required to keep the Home operating and a sale of the building is progressing.

​The Yorkshire Miners’ Welfare Convalescence Home charity who owns the home is continuing to support beneficiaries and staff during this difficult period. The trustees of the Home are currently discussing how the charity will use the funds from the property sale to support beneficiaries going forward and plans will be communicated in the coming weeks and months.  

​We fully understand the disappointment and impact this decision will have on our beneficiaries and staff. Please be assured that the trustees remain committed to keeping all stakeholders informed about the future of the charity.

22nd December 2025 for sale – offers over £630,000

Hi, there are a few point that we feel need addressing, the WiFi kept going off. Both shower heads were very high and we could not adjust them. The grouting in the bathroom floor was broken, which made the tiles loose and needs attention. The toilet in the bathroom was loose and felt insecure. The cooker was not properly secured to the housing, it felt loose in the housing. The TV kept loosing signal and the picture would break up – thank God for youtube, as that was pretty good

Apart from the points mentioned the apartment was clean and tidy and very nice.

Reviewed by S 4.0 ★

We have previously stayed at Manor Heath on four occasions and always enjoy it and look forward to our next visit. We stayed in apartment two, which was very comfortable, but would benefit from a coffee table or nest of tablets, so you could relax and put your drinks on it

Reviewed by Sharon 5.0 ★

Seaside Hideaway combines a fantastic North Bay location with comfortable rooms, delicious breakfasts and a warm personal welcome from your hosts, Jim and Sarah.

If you’re thinking about a spring break by the coast, take a look at our spring breaks in Scarborough guide for ideas on where to stay and what to do.

Seaside Hideaway

Penrhyn Bay 2026

Posted on by modernmoocher

Penrhyn Bay is a peaceful seaside town and residential suburb of Llandudno in Conwy County, North Wales, known for its scenic sand-and-shingle beach. Located east of the Little Orme, it offers coastal walks, rock pooling, and a quiet alternative to nearby bustling resorts. The area is popular for its local community feel, nearby seal spotting, and easy access to North Wales attractions.

Wikipedia

Like a moth to a flame, I’m here again.

Following several recent suburban posts in my local area, I decided to take a train to Colwyn Bay, in order to revisit an old friend, last seen in 2023.

The quality of light and the well behaved deportment of the houses and owners, exuded the demeanour of a model village.

There are new model cars, extensions, impressed drives, garden ornamentation, quirkily rendered reliefs and cladding.

Take a look.

Mount Pleasant Car Park – Liverpool

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38 Mount Pleasant Liverpool L3 5TB

Excellent price – max £4 for whole day. Awkward to exit on foot, it needs more signage, but worth a bit of faffing around for the very reasonable cost. Really easy to pay by phone, although it costs an extra 20p to do this. As other have said, it closes at 8pm, but great for daytime adventures!

2017

Open 24 hours, no lifts but cheap. Always managed to find a space.

2023

Parkopedia

Crosville buses DVG279 and ENL826 head out of Liverpool past the multi-storey car park and AUEW offices in Mount Pleasant.

One of Liverpool’s traditional “Freddie Boswell” street sweepers is going down the hill with his dustcart.

Photo 1985 Chris Palmer

On my way somewhere else, took a left off Lime Street to walk around and about this monumental concrete car park.

I was on my way to see Ed Ruscha amongst other things.

Volare Digital Camera

I think he would have admired the view.

No fancy cladding and a limited pedestrian access, should you happen to be sans auto.

Attached to the car park is the 051 Complex – made for the Liverpool dialling code.

Club 051, ofiveone, The 05’…

Whatever you wish to call it, this iconic venue has touched the hearts of literally hundreds of thousands of clubbers spanning its illustrious history. Those infamous stairs down to the dance floor are truly part of clubbing folklore for those who have walked them, and now because of a team of people who dared to dream, you can once again enjoy the spine chilling ofiveone experience! 

Because dreams can come true 

Are You 051 Enough?

Green Pastures – Heaton Mersey

Posted on by modernmoocher

Further adventures in suburban housing.

Here is my first day’s findings in the West Heatons – followed by the next day in the West Heatons, the next and the West Heatons Cul de Sacs.

And my startling evocation of Suburbia.

1892-1914

For my part I cannot help bur recall the TV show Green Acres whenever I pass by Green Pastures.

Eva Gabor preferring the glamour of Manhattan.

To the rural life.

Culturally and stylistically, Green Pastures sits somewhere betwixt and between.

In reality the fictional life of Green Pastures became Mulberry Close, in the hit TV show Inside No. Nine

Vinette Robinson, Reece Shearsmith, Adrian Scarborough, Steve Pemberton and Dorothy Atkinson.

So much for the scriptwriters wild imaginings, what does the road look like?

A broad sweeping swathe of tarmac, with a range of 70s housing typologies – wall less gardens, where grass becomes easily impressed concrete, gravel and artfully paved car parks.

Asymmetric roof, bedroom balcony with optional infill, ever more pointless integrated garage, as the inflated automobile refuses to fit in.

The ubiquitous carriage lamp, B&Q Georgian front door and hanging basket, all head up the relentless quest to defy period integrity, in favour of a free market, free for all of undiluted historicism.

The future and the past and the houses are infinitely all extendable.

Butetown Cardiff – Housing

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Butetown – or The Docks Tre-biwt is a district and community in the south of the city of Cardiff. It was originally a model housing estate built in the early 19th century by the 2nd Marquess of Bute, for whose title the area was named. 

Commonly known as Tiger Bay, this area became one of the UK’s first multiculturalcommunities with people from over fifty countries settled here by the outbreak of the First World War, working in the docks and allied industries. Some of the largest communities included the Somalis, Yemenis and Greeks, whose influence still lives on today.

A Greek Orthodox church still stands at the top of Bute Street.

Wikipedia

In 1906, work began on the present-day church, which also serves the Russian Orthodox community in south Wales. Designed by local architects, James and Morgan, it is located on a site provided by the 4th Marquess of Bute, to the west of Bute Street. The modestly-sized building is of Byzantine style with a domed nave and an apse at the east end. It retains the original dedication to St Nicholas. The interior is very ornate, with a lot of carved woodwork. The dome and upper walls have painted Biblical scenes in vivid colours with gold decoration.

David Webb, Glamorgan Archives Volunteer

Photo: Richard Swingler

Loudoun Square was originally built in the mid-1850s as upmarket homes for merchants, mariners, ship brokers and the like around a central park.

Photo 1962

In the 1960s, most of the original housing was demolished including the historic Loudoun Square, the original heart of Butetown. In its place was a typical 1960s housing estate of low-rise courts and alleys, and two high-rise blocks of flats.

Between 1960 and 1966 two sixteen-storey tower blocks, Loudoun House and Nelson House, were built on the centre of Loudoun Square

The demolition of the old buildings in Bute Street gets under way in 1963.

Peoples Collection Wales 1977

Photo Miles Glendinning 1988.

Surveybase have undertaken detailed scanning and modelling prior to the planned post Grenfell re-cladding.

The Loudoun Square regeneration project is a collaboration between Cardiff City Council, Cardiff Community Housing Association, Cardiff Local Health Board and Cardiff and Vale NHS Trust. The site is located between Cardiff City Centre and Cardiff Bay, and was previously occupied by an existing health centre and local shops, together with a vacant area of land.

The area has been regenerated with the creation of new modern facilities to serve the local community and include a new health centre, shops, affordable homes and community facilities.

Austin Smith Lord

West Heatons Part Four – Stockport Housing

Posted on by modernmoocher

Following on from my essay on Suburbia and Part One of West Heatons Housing, here’s Part Two and Part Three

Taking in Mauldeth Road, Pinewood Close and Leegate Gardens

Mauldeth Road is lined with larger houses, Victorian and interwar villas, bijou apartments and the odd Modernist interloper.

Through the avenues and alleyways, home to those ever so tidy inter and postwar enclaves.

Where a mans gotta work out which side he’s on
Any way he chooses
Chances are he loses
No one gets to live too long

Though in my experience the converse is true, this is a mature community gently maturing, on the inside of everything.

Hiding what may possibly be hidden behind the hedge, though the privacy of privet is in retreat, replaced by bay, birch, holly and the extremely hardy laurel.

The left hand house has purposefully retained the original Crittall Windows.

West Heatons Part Three – Cul de Sacs

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High above the streets of Stockport – zooming in to a cluster of cul de sacs branching out from Tithe Barn Road.

Cul de sac translates as bottom of the bag, the French do not use the term, preferring voie sans issue, literally a dead end.

In the slums of New York City, on the East River just below the Queensboro Bridge, wealthy people live in opulent and luxurious apartments because of the picturesque views of the river, while the destitute and poor live nearby in crowded, cockroach-infested tenements.

Wikipedia

I assume that countless civic meetings and Estate Agents’ offices eschew the terminal term – dead end, in favour of the assumed elegance of the cu de sac.

Polanski’s second English-language feature, it follows two injured gangsters who take refuge in the remote island castle of a young British couple in the North of England, spurring a series of mind games and violent altercations.

Wikipedia

I was informed by a local resident that the streets and houses had been used by film crews, firstly for ease of access, the location being closed off, and secondly as the period architecture aligns perfectly with the current penchant for mid-century styling.

The End of the F***ing World 2017 – location unknown

Within the typology there area number of variants, bungalow, dormer bungalow, link detached, semi-detached and detached.

Very very few of the homes have retained their original features, the imperative of our age is to extend and improve.

There is a covenant in the deeds which prevents the building of border fencing – therefore the development retains its small-scale suburban American ambience.

The home below seems to have benefited from retrofitted green credentials.

Here is my first day’s findings in the West Heatons – followed by the next day in the West Heatons, and the next.

And my startling evocation of Suburbia.

Coincidentally, I wrote about Tithe Barn School some years ago.

West Heatons Part Two – Stockport Housing

Posted on by modernmoocher

Following on from my essay on Suburbia and Part One of West Heatons Housing – here’s Part Two.

Taking in Thornfield Road, Priestnall Road, Beaminster Road, Mauldeth Close, Sunnyfield Road, Freshfield Road, Cavendish Road, Pleachway, Ranworth Avenue, Thornhill Road and Mersey Road.

Within such a tight network of suburban streets, restrained Modernism sits alongside the traditional semi, the grand villa and humble abode. A smattering of stained glass and an original door here and there.

One example of a curved Crittall bay, sitting next door to a distant uPVC cousin.

Hesitant examples of Arts and Crafts and hints of Tudorbethan, subtle shades of sub Lutyens, the odd Art Deco detail.

We never keep to the present. We recall the past; we anticipate the future as if we found it too slow in coming and were trying to hurry it up, or we recall the past as if to stay its too rapid flight. We are so unwise that we wander about in times that do not belong to us, and do not think of the only one that does; so vain that we dream of times that are not and blindly flee the only one that is. The fact is that the present usually hurts. We thrust it out of sight because it distresses us, and if we find it enjoyable, we are sorry to see it slip away. We try to give it the support of the future, and think how we are going to arrange things over which we have no control for a time we can never be sure of reaching. 

Blaise Pascal

Let each of us examine his thoughts; he will find them wholly concerned with the past or the future. We almost never think of the present, and if we do think of it, it is only to see what light it throws on our plans for the future. The present is never our end. The past and the present are our means, the future alone our end. Thus we never actually live, but hope to live, and since we are always planning how to be happy, it is inevitable that we should never be so.

West Heatons Part One – Stockport Housing

Posted on by modernmoocher

Following on from my brief essay on Suburbia – here are my first day’s findings.

West Heatons Part Two – now available!

In 1896 the area to the east of central Stockport is a potpourri of emergent industry, railways, a river and agriculture – a product of the second Ice Age, the subsequent formation of the Mersey Valley and the Industrial Revolution.

By 1911 there is an expansion in the housing stock.

A comprehensive history of the area cane be found here.

In 1918, the UK property landscape was dominated by private renters, who made up 75% of all households. At the time, only 25% of the population owned their own homes. Over the next few decades, home ownership gradually increased, reaching about 38% by 1958. This shift was accompanied by a decrease in private renting, which fell to 41% during the same period.

The most significant growth in home ownership occurred between 1958 and 2003. The percentage of owner-occupiers surged from 38% to 70%. This period saw a corresponding decline in both private renting, which fell to just 8% in 2003, and social renting, which peaked at 29% in 1978 before declining to 22% by 2003.

Belvoir

More detailed analysis of trends in home ownership can be found here at the Office for National Statistics.

The pattern of home ownership has been determined by a number of factors –

The Property Owning Democracy –  Coined by British MP Noel Skelton in 1920, the concept emphasised the terms ‘property-owning’ and ‘democracy’ as a conservative response to left-leaning ideas of liberalism and socialism.

Right to Buy scheme, introduced by Margaret Thatcher’s Housing Act 1980, allowed long-term council social tenants in England and Wales to buy their homes at a significant discount, fostering homeownership but drastically reducing the stock of affordable social housing, leading to ongoing housing shortages and debates over its legacy.

The Property Ladder which commodifies housing. Where once house and home were largely for life, the upwardly mobile homeowner wishes to continually acquire value and status through trading ever onwards and upwards.

Socially the role of the home has also changed over time, once a place to be outside of – working or playing, the home is now possibly a place of both work and play. A larger percentage of weekly earnings is now absorbed by housing costs, and the lure of the multi-channel Smart TV, gaming systems, take away food and supermarket lager, nails the residents’ slippers firmly to the laminate flooring.

This has gone hand in hand with the trend home improvements and extensions – fed by glossy magazines, design led property TV shows advocating a New England, Shabby Chic, Maxi/Minimalist Vibe.

Welcome to the new England.

It’s January 2026 and I have taken to the area between Mauldeth Road, Thornfield Road, Queens Drive and Didsbury Road.

What is actually going on in my locale? – The only way to find out is to go and take a good look around.

Symbol of middle-class aspiration, conservatism and compromised individualism, the semi-detached house is England’s modern domestic type par excellence.

Architectural Review

Semi-detached houses are the most common property type in the United Kingdom. They accounted for 32% of UK housing transactions and 32% of the English housing stock in 2008. Between 1945 and 1964, 41% of all properties built were semis. 

Semi-detached houses for the middle class began to be planned systematically in late 18th-century Georgian architecture, as a suburban compromise between the terraced houses close to the city centre, and the detached villas further out, where land was cheaper.

Although semi-detached housing is built throughout the world, it is generally seen as particularly symbolic of the suburbanisation of the United Kingdom and Ireland.

Wikipedia

Curtis Road, Heyscroft Road, Brompton Road, Carlton Road, Fylde Road, Mauldeth Road and Thornhill Road.

So what did I discover?

The homeowners quest for the individual within a typology, no two doors the same, render re-rendered, period details largely erased, occasionally preserved, windows awash with white uPVC, along with the more recent incursion of one shade of grey, front gardens replaced by unimpressive pressed concrete car parking, cars and more cars, bay windows held at bay by red brick walls and well-trimmed beech hedges.

 

My pink half of the drainpipe
Separates next door from me
My pink half of the drainpipe
Oh, Mama – belongs to me

Viv Stanshall

Suburbia

Posted on by modernmoocher

My baby takes the morning train
He works from nine till five and then
He takes another home again
To find me waitin’ for him

Sheena Easton

Welcome to the land of Terry and June – the seemingly complacent home to the newly aspirational classes, anathema to those thrill seeking Modernists, embracing the dynamism of the city, or those Ruralists protecting the integrity of the countryside.

Tradition has broken down. Taste is utterly debased, the town, long since degraded, is now being annihilated by a flabby, shoddy, romantic nature worship. That romantic nature worship is destroying also the object of its adoration, the countryside.

Thomas Sharp – Town Planner

Welcome to the land of the Lucie Attwell Bicky House biscuit tin money box.

The perfect model home for the modern model family.

In Coming up for Air, George Orwell describes a suburban road as:

A prison with cells in a row. A line of semi-detached torture chambers.

Literary London

The growth of British towns and cities, from the onset of the Industrial Revolution, created a demand for new homes, the earliest developments were close to the centres of production and administration. Followed by the creation of outlying estates for the fleeing middle classes, as the smoke began to billow and the trains and buses began to run.

Originally the work of speculative private enterprise, followed by homes built by the local authority along with charitable institutions.

My own experience has taught me that Suburbia is architecturally diverse, socially less so, as various areas are segregated by class, and perhaps less so by ethnicity and/or culture.

The majority of the population live in Suburbia it seems, there now follows a selection of the suburban sites which I have visited in the last ten years or so.

In search of Suburbia.

There are areas of Victorian terraced housing Manchester which survived clearance – such as Jetson Street in Abbey Hey.

Many early estates of the early Twentieth Century where heavily influenced by the Garden City Movement , exemplified by the Burnage Garden Village.

And similar in design Ford Lane Didsbury.

By 1931 1.1 million council houses were built and 2.8 million privately owned homes.

Post WW2 the emphasis was on an expansion of social housing, along with a growth in privately owned property – detailed information and analysis of social housing can be found here at Municipal Dreams.

These homes were at times both temporary and of non-standard construction.

This prefabricated house was originally built for the good folk of Doncaster, later finding itself in Humberston Fitties

These Wythenshawe BISF Homes designed by Frederick Gibberd, the so-called Tin Town are still very much habitable homes.

Likewise these examples in Hebden Bridge.

The Pre-Fab Museum is a treasure trove of information, along with Non Standard House Construction.

Post war development was inextricably linked to the New Towns.

The new towns in the United Kingdom were planned under the powers of the New Towns Act 1946 and later acts to relocate people from poor or bombed-out housing following World War II. Designated new towns were placed under the supervision of a development corporation, and were developed in three waves. Later developments included the “expanded towns”: existing towns which were substantially expanded to accommodate what was called the “overspill” population from densely populated areas of deprivation.

Wikipedia

One such New Town was Peterlee, in the north east of England, where I visited in 2021 and 2025.

Along with Cumbernauld in Scotland.

Cwmbran in south Wales.

In addition there are examples of European influence in the design of inter and post WW2 housing.

The Bull Ring Liverpool 1935.

Leo Fitzgerald House of 1940 in Dublin displays a similar European influence.

Corporation Street Flats Stafford 1951-52

Later examples such as Fort Ardwick in Manchester proved to be badly built and ill advised choices for social housing.

The Byker Estate has proved to be much more durable.

Whilst Park Hill has undergone a change from social housing to largely private ownership and rental.

The St Thomas Estate in Radcliffe, mixes the traditional terrace with a modern twist on social housing.

Private developers opted for Span style homes, such as these at Deneway Stockport 1964

Further afield in the former fields of Cheshire are the out of the way, not way out, Woodford executive homes.

In Heald Green we find the slightly less executive homes.

Even further afield the seaside enclave of Penrhyn Bay.

Prompted by a recent viewing of Graham Williamson’s Suburban film, I decided to undertake further in depth research around my own suburban locale.

Here is my first day’s findings in the West Heatons – followed by the next day in the West Heatons.

Housing – Plantation Glasgow

Posted on by modernmoocher

1885

Plantation is an area in the city of Glasgow, Scotland. It is situated south of the River Clyde and is part of the former Burgh of Govan. It lies approximately between the areas of Cessnock and Ibrox to the west, Kingston to the east, and Kinning Park to the south.

The 80-acre Craigiehall estate, previously three smaller properties, was bought in 1783 by John Robertson, a cashier in the Glasgow Arms Bank, who with his brothers owned cotton and sugar plantations in the West Indies. He renamed it Plantation, possibly as a reminder of the West Indies plantations. It then, in 1793, passed to John Mair, a merchant who developed the building and gardens. Plantation passed to the Maclean family, in 1829, in the person of William Maclean, a Glasgow Baillie.

In the years that followed, the estate was bisected by the railway to the south, with the shipbuilding yards of The Clyde Trust cutting off the estate from the river. Plantation was laid out for tenement houses in the 1870s and Maclean, Plantation, Mair and Craigiehall Streets refer to the history of the old estate.

Plantation Quay formed part of the site for the Glasgow Garden Festival in 1988 and subsequent Glasgow Science Centre.

Wikipedia

1912

A crowd gathered to watch a football match at Plantation, 1955. The players in dark jerseys appear to be celebrating a goal.

The mostly male spectators are focused on the game, while in the foreground a couple of women pass by with prams. The tenements in the background provide their inhabitants with a bird’s-eye view of the match. Other spectators are perched on top of a high wall separating the tenement back courts from the football pitch.

In 1955 Partick Camera Club set out to create a photographic survey of Glasgow. As the project progressed, other camera clubs joined and each was allocated a district of the city to photograph. Glasgow Museums exhibited the photographs at Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum and at the People’s Place, and in 1956 the exhibition was shown at the Palace of Art in Bellahouston Park. The photographs are now part of Glasgow Museums’ collections.

The Glasgow Story

Plantation Street 1965 Photo: Eric Watt

So the folks, homes, industry and streets of the past have been and gone.

I was walking through the area in March 2023 one quite quiet morning, and attracted by the neat rows of austere grey terraces, low rise blocks and maisonettes, which have replaced the tenements.

The estate is clean and well maintained, open areas of grass criss crossed with pedestrian paths, surrounded by mature trees, motor cars have discrete parking areas.

Kingston Bridge – Glasgow

Posted on by modernmoocher

The bridge on the River Clyde – and access to the city’s motorway system.

The Kingston Bridge is a balanced cantilever dual-span ten lane road bridge made of triple-cell segmented prestressed concrete box girders crossing the River Clyde.

Carrying the M8 motorway through the city centre, the Kingston Bridge is one of the busiest bridges in Europe, carrying around 150,000 vehicles every day.

The bridge was first proposed in 1945 as part of the Glasgow Inner Ring Road scheme. After feasibility studies were carried out, William Fairhurst was appointed consulting engineer for the design of the bridge and its approaches and on 15 May 1967 construction began; this was a joint venture between Duncan Logan Construction Ltd and Marples Ridgway.

The eventual cost was £2.4m excluding the approach viaducts or around £11m in total.

On 26 June 1970 Kingston Bridge was opened by Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother.

Wikipedia

I was lodging nearby and spent an hour one morning in March 2023 taking a look around.

The Kingston Bridge was listed in 2020 by Historic Environment Scotland.

Co-operative House was the former headquarters of the Scottish Co-operative Wholesale Society and today is a mixed residential and commercial development.

There is a dubious urban myth that the fourth man in the Williamwood bank robbery, Archie McGeachy, is buried in the pillars of the bridge.

It features in the music video for the Simple Minds single – Speed Your Love to Me.

Cambridge Street Car Park – Glasgow

Posted on by modernmoocher

On the corner off Cowcaddens Road and Cambridge Street sits Cambridge Street Car Park.

In March 2024 I was wandering around in search of nothing in particular when I found something particular, in car park form.

Parkopedia

It does have a spiral ramp access – so I took that route to the top deck.

Portwood 2025

Posted on by modernmoocher

A chaotic situation is always deliberately produced. Ask yourself who or what sort of creature could benefit from such a situation. 

William S Burroughs – The Place of Dead Roads

We have been here before tracing the history of Portwood, also, once upon a time finding a lost photo album. returning in 2021 to take a look around.

To the west of the site the tower blocks of Lancashire Hill two twenty two storey blocks containing one hundred and ninety eight dwellings.

View of Pendlebury Towers and Stonemill Terrace, original Commissioning Authority: Stockport County Borough Council

1987

Tower Block UK

Below the flats of Lancashire Hill the River Tame, which meets with the River Goyt to from the River Mersey.

To the south the Manchester Outer Ring Road – M60.

The boundary completed by Tesco Extra and a Porsche Dealership.

We can see the remains of the road system of this former industrial site, now colonised by brambles and greenery, the imposition of earth mounds and fly tipping.

The slow accretion of detritus and undergrowth.