and sprawls outwards along the main roads into the country unless
that tendency be checked. Every mile that it grows outwards means a
few minutes’ extra time for travelling to and from work, congestion
increases at the centre, and the country--as a place for recreation--is
driven further and further away. A feeling that this system is
essentially wrong has resulted in some well-meant efforts to create
“Satellite Towns,” of which Letchworth and Welwyn are examples. They
are satellites to London in the sense that London is within hail for
emergencies: thus Harley Street is a useful resort in some cases, while
the sanctuary of the British Museum Reading Room satisfies bookworms,
and Oxford Street contents the other sex. But the main object of
the promoters was to remove industries and workers bodily into the
country, so that labour might be carried on in pleasant surroundings,
never more than a few minutes’ walk from green fields. The intention
is to limit the ultimate population of these towns to 30,000-50,000.
When that figure is reached, another centre will be started. So far,
neither town has grown very rapidly, and industry has been slow to
move out, in spite of the heavy cost of carrying on business in
London. But the “Satellite Town,” a praiseworthy attempt to secure the
amenities of the old country town for modern workers, is a factor to
be reckoned with in the future. The new L.C.C. town at Becontree in
Essex is being properly laid out on rational town-planning lines, but
is to be purely residential, for people working in London, so does
not constitute a “Satellite Town.” A remarkably successful scheme for
providing something better than the ordinary haphazard suburb, which
normally deteriorates with the certainty of clockwork, is to be seen in
the Hampstead Garden Suburb. This will never deteriorate appreciably,
because its residents are guaranteed against any interference with
their amenities. It is laid out scientifically, not merely exploited on
short-sighted commercial methods.
But though so much can be done by means of town-planning, that new
power has not yet been utilised to any appreciable extent in regard to
controlling the actual design of buildings. The high level of design
achieved at Hampstead and Welwyn is due to private control exercised
by a Company, but Ruislip, Bath, and--quite recently--Edinburgh, have
adopted the clause in the Town-Planning Act which allows an authority
to prescribe the “character” of buildings, and thus to veto any design
which, in their opinion, is likely to conflict with the amenities of
the place.
There was, as we all know, a great development of municipal housing
after the War. It was encouraged, subsidised, and even controlled
to some extent by the State, which still continues its work in that
direction, though in a greatly modified form. The houses erected under
these auspices have been subjected to a great deal of criticism, much
of it both ignorant and ill-natured. Let us recall the circumstances.
A vast number of dwellings had to be provided in a great hurry for men
who had every claim on the nation’s gratitude. Through no fault of
their own they were homeless. For a variety of reasons these houses
were very expensive, even allowing for the general rise in prices.
There was a wave of idealism in the air, and the authorities had taken
opinions from every reliable source as to the type of house required:
these were to be “homes for heroes,” with a bath h. and c. A book of
designs was prepared in Whitehall for the guidance of local authorities
and their architects. These designs met with general approval among
competent critics, but with some derision from the general public, who
greeted the “homes for heroes” as “rabbit-hutches” or “boxes.” That
was because they were devoid of trimmings and built in small groups
instead of in long rows. There are housing-schemes good and bad, but
most people who understand architecture and who are prepared to wait
a few years, till hedges and trees have given these simple buildings
their proper setting, consider that the new houses generally represent
an advance on anything done hitherto. Simplicity in building is, within
limits, a virtue, especially in the country.
The design of these houses was entrusted to architects to an extent
never approached previously; sometimes they were the work of private
practitioners, sometimes of young architects employed under the
direction of the local surveyor, sometimes by the local surveyor or
engineer himself. The degree of ability in design possessed by these
several functionaries is naturally reflected in their products. In that
queer book _Antic Hay_, Mr. Aldous Huxley makes an eccentric architect,
“Gumbril Senior,” voice his views on the design of artisan houses: “I’m
in luck to have got the job, of course, but really, that a civilised
man should have to do jobs like that. It’s too much. In the old days
these creatures built their own hovels, and very nice and suitable they
were too. The architects busied themselves with architecture--which is
the expression of human dignity and greatness, which is man’s protest,
not his miserable acquiescence.” But Gumbril Senior was a visionary,
and most architects feel that they can do much to save England in her
present plight. The trouble is that they are allowed to do so little.
It is equally possible to expect a reasonably high standard of design
in the other buildings erected under a local authority: its schools,
libraries, and so on. Nor ought one to find unworthy architecture
produced by any Government Department, whether it be a post-office,
a telephone-exchange, a military barracks, or a coastguard station
on a lonely cliff. There was a time when every post-office and
police-station bore the marks of red-tape, but of late there has been
a noteworthy change for the better. Again and again one sees with
pleasure a village post-office or telephone-exchange which harmonises
perfectly with the old village street. No longer are the designs
stereotyped; local tradition and local colouring are considered. As
time passes we may hope to witness the disappearance of the hideous
sheds and huts that survive to remind us of the War, now so long ended.
Apart from national and municipal architecture, the design of which
must be assumed to be in competent hands, there is a great deal of
building carried out by large corporate bodies who have it in their
power to insist on good design, and above all on design which
accords with local surroundings. Among these are railway companies,
banks, “multiple” shops, and brewery companies. Among many of these
various undertakings there seems to be positively an architectural
renaissance at work, and real imagination is being displayed at last.
The Underground Railways in and round London are employing clever
artists to design their stations and notices and posters, some of
the other railways are providing really attractive houses for their
employees, and both public-houses and banks in the country-towns are
slowly beginning to take on the colour of their environment. There are
two other types of commercial undertaking which might well follow this
excellent example: the cinema companies and the garage proprietors.
Between them they continue to furnish us with a plentiful stock of
eyesores all over the country, mainly because they are striving to
attract notice and because they always forget to take their hats off
to the village street. If the Council for the Preservation of Rural
England can do anything to teach them better manners they will
effect a real service to England. Occasionally one sees an attractive
petrol-station: a few pounds spent in prizes would produce a crop of
good designs from architects. One hesitates to offer any advice to the
builders of churches of any kind, but here again one asks no more than
decent respect for the spirit of old England.
The toughest nut to crack in all this matter of design is, however,
the question of the shop and the dwelling-house, under which head I
include, as a matter of courtesy, the bungalow. An Englishman’s house
is his castle, and he resents any interference with the rights of the
subject. Is it reasonable to impose on him any restriction as to the
outward appearance of his home, in regard to its design, its colour, or
the materials of which it is composed? It is true that he has to submit
to local building by-laws which prescribe the thicknesses of walls,
size of timbers, precautions to be taken against fire, and many matters
concerned with health. Often he has to place his house a specified
distance back from the road, behind what is called a “building-line.”
But the local authority is not empowered to interfere in any matter
of æsthetics, unless it adopts the Town-Planning Act and enforces the
clause, already mentioned, relating to the “character” of buildings.
But such “interference” is not unknown in the case of leasehold
property. Many owners of large estates insert clauses in leases
prescribing the materials to be used in building, the size of house
to be erected, perhaps the tints to be used in painting, and almost
always insist that painting is to be done every so many years. They may
also require that no garages, sheds, or other excrescences are to be
added to the building without the permission of their surveyor. It is
quite reasonable to suggest that these restrictions might be increased
to achieve the purpose we have in mind. Thus the frequent instances
that we see of a row of stucco dwellings being distempered different
colours, and thereby destroying the effect of a balanced architectural
scheme, might be avoided. The present ruling autocrat in Italy has
recently introduced a measure to deal with this very point, and
tenants of houses in a street have to distemper their external walls
the same colour at the same time. Much of the “restless” appearance
of modern streets and terraces is due to a neglect of this obvious
procedure. A concerted appeal to large owners of property to safeguard
the amenities of their estates by further action on various lines might
lead to great improvement, and something might even be done in the same
direction by restrictive covenants in conveyances of freehold land.
Much has been said lately about the necessity for the control of the
speculative builder who continues to provide most of the smaller houses
and bungalows and shops in this country, and this is the most difficult
problem of all. Such control must obviously have the sanction of the
law to be effective, and therefore must be ultimately vested in the
local authorities, for it is impossible to imagine that Whitehall is to
be held responsible for the approval of every plan in the country. As I
have already pointed out, the rural districts present the most urgent
case for our attention, and here control is most difficult of all.
In a great city like Manchester or Leeds a local Fine Art Committee
might be formed of people competent enough and disinterested enough to
exercise this very delicate function in a statesmanlike way, without
fear or favour. Edinburgh, Bath and Oxford have already led the way:
towns like Cambridge, Coventry, and Canterbury would be well advised to
follow suit. Birmingham has an Advisory Art Committee without statutory
powers.
But imagine the Rural District Council of Nether Footlesby dealing
with a design by Sir Felix Lutfield, R.A., for a large country-house
in their area, for it must be remembered that control of design would
apply to houses great and small, designed by architects great and small
as well as by people who were not architects. These worthy men might
reject his plans because they disliked the appearance of the chimneys;
or Councillor Trapp, a plumber by calling, might have a grievance
against Sir Felix owing to an unfortunate difference of opinion arising
from a previous association in building. It is evident that such a
position is unthinkable. Nor would the situation be materially improved
if the two auctioneer-architects practising in Nether Footlesby, the
retired art-mistress living in the village, and the Vicar of the
parish, were entrusted with this responsible task. It needs little
imagination to realise that a small advisory committee of this calibre
would be nearly as dangerous and quite as futile as the Rural District
Council itself. Even if control were administered on a county basis,
there are small counties in England where it would be difficult to
enlist a committee of men whose decisions would be readily accepted
by the bigwigs of the architectural profession. It seems to me that a
very carefully drafted scheme of control might be organised for most
of the large cities and perhaps half the counties of England, though
even then the situation would bristle with difficulties, but for the
more scattered districts--where at least an equal number of mistakes
is being made--the problem seems insoluble. The London Society and the
Birmingham Civic Society are the sort of bodies that might be trusted
to frame a scheme, but even they would experience many setbacks before
they obtained statutory powers. Much good work in the direction of
controlling unwise development in France has been done by the local
_Syndicats d’initiative_, bodies which exist to preserve the amenities
of each town or district. A study of the methods used in France, and of
measures adopted recently in Italy, would doubtless be helpful in our
own case.
Failing control of this kind, it has been suggested that the builder
must be “brought to his senses,” in the diplomatic words of a writer in
_The Times_ of January 7th, 1927. But, so long as the builder continues
to sell his houses without any difficulty and at a considerable profit,
he may not see any reason for admitting that he is deficient in sense.
Who, for instance, is to be empowered to stop him decorating his gables
with a ludicrous parody of half-timbering, made of inch boards which
warp in the sun? The small builder obtains many of his designs from
printed books or from weekly journals, and the following authentic
extract from a recent publication shows how it is done:
“Having a plot of land 80-ft. frontage by 120-ft., I should be
pleased if some reader would submit a plan and elevation-sketch of a
detached house, something attractive, dainty, and _very arresting_.”
The words I have italicised explain some of our present troubles. The
desire of the builder and of his client, for the “very arresting” house
causes many of the incongruous additions to our landscape. Something
might be done, as the President of the R.I.B.A. has suggested, to
supply the builder with stock designs of good character, adapted to
the needs of each locality; for, as I have noted before, the use of
copybooks in the eighteenth century produced houses which if sometimes
dull were at least dignified and often charming. But a process of very
slow conversion will be necessary before we can hope to rid the public
of this desire for “very arresting” buildings.
In the control of design would have to be included restrictions
on colour and material _so far as is reasonable_, but it is quite
impracticable nowadays to insist that a man building a house in a
Yorkshire dale must employ the traditional stone walls and stone
slates: it is doubtful if anybody will ever legally prevent him using
the pink asbestos-cement tiles that clash so violently with the dull
tones of the landscape. Similarly, it is idle to expect that a modern
factory building should be erected to harmonise perfectly with rural
surroundings: one can only ask that its designer may bear in mind
the spirit of the place, and treat it as tenderly as circumstances
permit. But we may reasonably press for further action in the abatement
of factory smoke and domestic smoke, for that nuisance spreads
forty or fifty miles away from industrial areas, and cities like
Leicester--where smoke is hardly visible--are few and far between.
The Coal Smoke Abatement Society has long worked towards this end,
and its arguments are familiar to most people. Its supporters are
convinced that smoky chimneys are wasteful as well as unhealthy and
unpleasant. But it seems certain that we can eliminate a large part of
our coal-smoke by utilising electric power far more extensively than
we now do, by harnessing our rivers and by utilising all the waste
water-power that is running from reservoirs to towns in aqueducts and
pipes.
It has been suggested lately that much of the ugliness of colliery
districts might be mitigated by judicious planting of trees on
pit-banks. But smoke is one factor that prevents this, for it blackens
and stunts all vegetation. Then the recent coal-strike showed that
in any such emergency gleaners would soon be at work on the banks,
grubbing for coal among the tree-roots. Lastly, even if trees did grow
in such inhospitable soil, there is some doubt whether they would be
tenderly treated by those for whose benefit they were planted.
It has been pointed out, earlier in this chapter, that Acts of
Parliament have already empowered local authorities to remove unsightly
hoardings and advertisements of all kinds, so that it only remains now
for public opinion to press them to proceed in this admirable work.
The author of _Nuntius_, in this series of essays, prophesies that
advertising will not become more aggressive, adding that a sign which
spoils a beautiful landscape is a very ineffective advertisement and
hence that the “few existing” (_sic_) will soon disappear. Let us hope
so. But one hesitates to accept his earlier statement that, if there
were no hoardings on empty sites, these would become rubbish dumps. At
all events, the recent action of the petrol combines in removing their
hideous advertisements nearly all over the countryside represents a
great victory for public opinion. On the whole, advertising is becoming
more artistic, possibly more restrained. But house-agents continue to
be terrible sinners in this respect. Close to my home is an avenue,
still miraculously preserving its beauty, though surely doomed. But
at the end of it is a group of seven enormous hoardings erected
cheek-by-jowl by rival agents and completely spoiling a fine vista. I
cannot see that any hardships would be inflicted on those Philistine
touts if all agents’ boards were restricted to a maximum size of 2
square feet. Those who wished could still read them, others need
not. There are many little details of design in village streets--the
inn-signs, the lettering of street-names, the lamp-standards--capable
of improvement on simple lines. In this connection one may mention the
work of the Rural Industries Bureau which, among its other activities
in encouraging the rustic craftsman, has endeavoured to find employment
for the village blacksmith on simple wrought-iron accessories in common
use and has prepared a selection of designs for his guidance.
Some day a genius may show us how to make wireless masts less
unsightly, or perhaps we may be able to discard them altogether as
science advances. But this innovation has not greatly spoiled our
villages, nor does it seem probable that air travel will much affect
the appearance of the countryside: a few more aerodromes perhaps, and
on them, it is to be hoped, a more attractive type of building. The air
lighthouse or beacon will spring up here and there; another subject for
the ambitious young architect in competition.
But though it is now evident that a very great deal may be done for the
preservation of rural England by the exercise of legislative powers
which local authorities already possess, and by pressure on corporate
bodies and private landowners of the best type, the ultimate success of
the new crusade will depend on its ability to influence public opinion.
Two kinds of opinion are involved, that of the country dwellers
themselves, and that of the urban invaders of the countryside. Probably
most young people now employed in remote villages and on farms would
give their skin to get away from what they regard as the monotony of
rural life, and one must sympathise with that view. The introduction
of wireless and cinemas will make their existence less irksome,
and the phenomenal increase of motor-bus facilities allows them to
travel cheaply and frequently to the nearest town, with its shops and
bright streets. But none of these things will teach them to prize the
country, rather the reverse, for many of the films they see show them
uglification at its worst--in the ricketty shacks of Western America.
It might be possible to teach them to admire their own heritage by
occasional lectures at the village institutes on town-planning and
architecture; not the architecture of great cathedrals and of foreign
buildings like the Parthenon, but the simple homely architecture of the
village church, the village barn, and the village cottage. A competent
lecturer accustomed to such an audience, avoiding like the plague all
sentimental talk about the glory of country life, might explain the
beauty of old bridges and mills, the simple skill of old craftsmen,
in such a way that his hearers would be less anxious to substitute
suburban vulgarities for everything that their rude forefathers of
the hamlet had made. Recently there was organised, in my own village,
an exhibition of drawings, engravings, maps, old documents, etc.,
illustrating the history and development of the district. It was
visited by a large number of people, including many children, and
undoubtedly it aroused much interest in things that had hitherto passed
unnoticed.
The urban motorist, whether he travels in a Rolls-Royce or a charabanc,
often provides an equally difficult problem. He may be a superior
person of great wealth, who avoids the hackneyed resorts of trippers
because he objects to the sight of beer-bottles and paper bags on the
heather, but, as a humorous artist recently reminded us, he probably
goes to a more secluded common and instructs his chauffeur to leave
the champagne bottles and disembowelled lobsters under a gorse-bush
there, for he has the soul and breeding of the tripper, and litter does
not offend him. The beach X---- in Romney Marsh, already mentioned,
was littered from end to end with newspapers, cigarette packets, and
confectioners’ debris, when last I saw it.
Untidiness, ugliness, lack of respect for history and beauty, an insane
craze for speed in getting from one futile pursuit to another, blatant
advertisement, sordid commercialism--these are some of the things
we have borrowed from American life to vulgarise our own. But when
Americans come over to England, the thing that impresses them most--far
more than anything we can do in our towns--is the harmony and peace of
the English village and the English countryside. They feel in their
bones that there we “have them beat.”
It is simply heart-breaking, to those of us who know how future
uglification may be avoided and how much of the blundering of the
past may be remedied, to see the process of deterioration steadily
continuing. With more of brains and less of greed, more of public
spirit and less of vested interests, rural England may yet be saved.
SOME ADDRESSES
THE COUNCIL FOR THE PRESERVATION OF RURAL ENGLAND,
33, Bloomsbury Square, W.C. 1.
THE GARDEN CITIES AND TOWN PLANNING ASSOCIATION,
3, Gray’s Inn Place, W.C. 1.
THE SOCIETY FOR THE PROTECTION OF ANCIENT BUILDINGS,
20, Buckingham Street, W.C. 2.
THE COMMONS AND FOOTPATHS PRESERVATION SOCIETY,
7, Buckingham Palace Gardens, S.W. 1.
THE COAL SMOKE ABATEMENT SOCIETY,
7, Buckingham Palace Gardens, S.W. 1.
THE NATIONAL TRUST FOR PLACES OF HISTORIC INTEREST OR NATURAL BEAUTY,
7, Buckingham Palace Gardens, S.W. 1.
THE SCAPA SOCIETY FOR THE PREVENTION OF DISFIGUREMENT IN TOWN AND
COUNTRY,
7, Buckingham Palace Gardens, S.W. 1.
THE RURAL INDUSTRIES INTELLIGENCE BUREAU,
20, Eccleston Street, S.W. 1.
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