Post-war social housing
young architects, including many working in the LCC’s Architect’s Department. However, the adopted moniker would in fact be proleptic of one of the core issues with the slab design.
While Le Corbusier developed his revolutionary ideas in southern France, Sweden was also a site of dramatic architectural and social innovation with respect to housing. As Britain sought to birth its own Welfare State, those responsible for housing looked to Sweden’s own long-established social housing system for inspiration. While distinctly modernist, the Scandinavian architects incorporated traditional vernacular elements into their constructions. This came to be known as the Contemporary style, with the specific concept of introducing familiar elements named ‘people’s detailing’ (Frampton, 1980 (A)). Indeed, Frampton asserts that ‘ this so- called ‘people’s detailing’ beca me, with local additions, the received vocabulary of the left-wing architects of the London County Council ’ . In the post-war period, the battle between the International and Contemporary styles would be fought in architect’s departments in councils across the country; with one of the most visible within the LCC played out in the Alton Estate in Roehampton.
Fig. 4: Alton Estate, Roehampton - an eleven- storey maisonette slab with the twelve-storey point blocks seen in the
distance (Galwey, 1954)
Built in the 1950s under the LCC, the Alton Estate was and is one of the best examples of both the Corbusian approach and the Swedish style, set in the beautiful scenery of Richmond Park. The first phase (1952-1955) – Alton East – is deeply influenced by the Swedish Contemporary style. The towers, while resolutely modernist, are constructed from traditional, local materials. Architect Sir Richard Rogers 15 comments that, despite being eleven stories high, ‘ they retain the feel of an English house ’ ( Building Sights Series 4: 6. Alton Estate. , 2019). Moreover, the point towers 16 are arranged within the site in a way which complements the original Georgian landscape. 17 As a result, the overall impression is one of modernized tradition; that this is not revolutionary. It is the future of the English vernacular.
By contrast, Alton West strictly follows the Corbusian model. Comprising five slab blocks on pilotis, it is arranged in a stark rectilinear pattern with access granted to each block by a footpath leading from
15 Famous for designing the MilleniumDome, the Pompidou Center in Paris, The Lloyds building in London, Terminal 5 at Heathrow Airport and others. 16 A tall building with a Gross Floor Construction Area not exceeding 743m². 17 Before the construction of the Alton Estate, the area contained a series of Georgian villas set in a landscaped garden.
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