Paul Smith’s talk will draw on his research into the history of Hartcliffe, designed by planners in the 1940s on the garden city model, built as a housing estate in the 1950s. This tale of the steady removal of planned facilities and the reduction in the quality of homes presented huge challenges to a community of ‘pioneers’ exported to the outskirts of the city. The story of Hartcliffe was repeated across the country as estates were built on the edges of towns and cities. This story has […]
The long awaited launch of Paul Smith's book Hartcliffe Betrayed: The fading of a poast-war dream, or how a garden city became a housing estate, 1943-1963. A salutary lesson for current planners can be drawn from this detailed examination of the failure of an ambitious project in the immediate post-war environment to live up to its expectations. Houses were desperately needed: What principles should underpin a new ‘settlement’? Where should the houses go? Who were they for? And what provision […]
7.00pm, Tuesday 22nd November, Filwood Library, Filwood Broadway, Bristol BS4 1JN The garden-city movement has had a significant impact on the development of Bristol as we know it. It aimed to create new neighbourhoods based on high-quality planning and housing design. This would transform the prospects for their residents by combining the best features of urban and rural life. BRHG member Steve Hunt will survey the influence of garden-suburb style planning upon Bristol’s spatial geography, from […]