Manley, Christine Hui Lan (2014) New town urbanity: theory and practice in housing design at Harlow. PhD thesis, The Glasgow School of Art. http://radar.gsa.ac.uk/4919 Copyright and moral rights for this thesis are retained by the author A copy can be downloaded for personal non-commercial research or study, without prior permission or charge This thesis cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the Author The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the Author When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given RADAR http://radar.gsa.ac.uk/ [email protected] NEW TOWN URBANITY THEORY AND PRACTICE IN HOUSING DESIGN AT HARLOW Christine Hui Lan Manley Submitted to the Glasgow School of Art in fulfilment of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy The Mackintosh School of Architecture MAY 2014 ii DECLARATION I, Christine Hui Lan Manley declare that the enclosed submission for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, consisting of a textual thesis, meets the regulations stated in the Glasgow School of Art Handbook for Supervised Postgraduate Research (2010) for the mode of submission selected and approved by the Research Degrees Sub- Committee. I declare that this submission is my own work, and has not been submitted for any other academic award. Signature of Author Date: Christine Hui Lan Manley Signature of Supervisor Date: Dr Robert Proctor iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to express gratitude to my Director of Studies Dr Robert Proctor for his advice and guidance throughout the course of this study. I would also like to thank Prof. John R. Gold, Dr Bruce Peter and Dr Madeleine Sclater for serving on my examination panel. In addition, I am grateful to Dr Raid Hanna, Dr Johnny Rodger and Ms Sally Stewart for conducting my mock Viva Voce. Thanks also to my Second Supervisor Prof. Florian Urban for his input and advice. I would especially like to thank Mr David Buri at the Glasgow School of Art library; I am sincerely grateful for his kindness and assistance throughout my studies. I would also like to thank Mrs Moira Jones and Miss Anne Pegrum at the Gibberd Garden Archive, for their patience, enthusiasm and hospitality. In addition, I am grateful to the helpful staff at the Essex Record Office. Thanks also to those who gave up their time to talk to me about the development of Harlow, in particular, Mr Stan Newens and Mr Ron Bill. I would especially like to thank Mr John Graham, for his time and for sharing his experiences with me. I thankfully acknowledge the Leverhulme Trust for funding my first year as well as the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) for supporting the final year of my studies. I am also very grateful to my parents Dr Berwick J W Manley and Mrs Ban Hwa Manley and to my sisters Dr K Shu San Manley and Miss C Hui Yang Manley for their support and encouragement. Thanks especially to Shu San for providing continuous motivation and inspiration and to Berwick for his feedback and editing efforts. Finally, I would like to thank Mr Brendan Mullard for his constant support throughout the course of this research project. iv ABSTRACT This study investigates how the concept of ‘urbanity’ was defined, developed and applied to the design of housing in British post-war New Towns. A number of modernist architects, particularly Sir Frederick Gibberd, considered ‘urbanity’ to be a visual town-like quality. Such concepts were part of a wider movement to reconsider the aesthetic dimension of town planning; ideas developed through architectural discourse during the 1940s and 50s, responding to (and sometimes contradicting) the earlier modernist principles of the 1930s, which emphasised the social and functional aspects of architecture and planning. Reacting to the low-density suburban developments of the inter-war period, Gibberd developed his own ideas about urbanity. Gibberd was a member of the avant-garde Modern Architectural Research Group (MARS Group); however, developing such aesthetic notions went against the principles of mainstream modernism. Nevertheless, the 1946 New Towns Act provided the ideal opportunity for Gibberd to test his visual planning theories, since after the War, he was selected to plan Harlow New Town. He served the New Town from conception to completion, maintaining his ambition to create a sense of urbanity throughout. Much of the housing has remained unchanged since construction and a number of areas have been studied to reveal the application of urbanity elements over the period of study (1947-1967). By examining Gibberd’s personal notes and sketches, as well as the discourse evident in architectural publications, Part 1 of the study aims to establish what ‘urbanity’ meant to Gibberd and other modernist architects during the 1940s and 50s. Through archive research, Part 2 investigates the ways in which Gibberd together with the Harlow Development Corporation (HDC) attempted to apply elements of urbanity to housing design at Harlow. The low densities prescribed by the Housing Manuals at first proved restrictive to Gibberd and the HDC, and v changing ideas about housing types, home ownership and ‘social balance’ also had an impact on the shape of Harlow. This thesis highlights Gibberd’s key role in the development and implementation of principles of visual town planning throughout the 1940s and 50s. However, where other modernist architects reaffirmed their commitment to social aspects of planning, Gibberd’s emphasis on aesthetics has led to the omission of Gibberd’s work at Harlow from conventional narratives of modern architecture and planning. This study challenges this idea by arguing that the theory and practice of ‘urbanity’ formed an alternative, additional strand of modernist thinking about town planning. vi NEW TOWN URBANITY THEORY AND PRACTICE IN HOUSING DESIGN AT HARLOW vii viii CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ....................................................................................... iv ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................ v CONTENTS ............................................................................................................... ix LIST OF FIGURES .................................................................................................. xii ABBREVIATIONS ................................................................................................ xvii INTRODUCTION ...................................................................................................... 1 THE NEW TOWNS ......................................................................................................5 MODERN ARCHITECTURE .......................................................................................8 DISCOURSE ...............................................................................................................13 MODERN ARCHITECTURE: DISCOURSE AND PRACTICE ...............................15 THE DISCOURSE ON VISUAL PLANNING ...........................................................17 URBANITY .................................................................................................................20 THESIS STRUCTURE ................................................................................................22 PART 1: THEORY ................................................................................................. 25 1 THE NEED FOR URBANITY ............................................................................ 28 1.1 THE LACK OF PLANNING ..............................................................................28 1.1.1 The Inter-War Suburbs ............................................................................28 1.1.2 The Density Debate .................................................................................41 1.1.3 Mixed Development and the Flat versus House argument ......................55 1.2 NEW PLANNING CONCEPTS ..........................................................................58 1.2.1 The MARS Group Town Planning Committee ........................................58 1.3 CONCLUSION ...................................................................................................63 2 DEFINING URBANITY ..................................................................................... 65 2.1 THE ARCHITECTURAL REVIEW ......................................................................65 2.1.1 Englishness and the Art of Making Urban Landscape ............................67 2.1.2 Townscape ..............................................................................................75 2.2 THE EARLY IDEAS OF GIBBERD AND SHARP ...........................................79 2.2.1 Civic Design ............................................................................................80 2.2.2 Gibberd’s Urbanity ................................................................................101 2.3 CONCLUSION ..................................................................................................104 ix PART 2: PRACTICE ............................................................................................ 106 3 DENSITY ........................................................................................................... 109 3.1 THE NEW TOWNS ..........................................................................................110