Birmingham’s Motor Age: courtesy of English Heritage The inner ring road and the infrastructure of the Manzoni era (1930’s to 1960’s) is today widely held as the biggest error in post war planning in Birmingham, itself often held up as an example of ...
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There was good news this month when it was announced that the 28 storey Alpha Tower building at the bottom end of Broad Street/Suffolk Street has been given grade II listed status by English Heritage. This sculptural modernist tower which was built in ...
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Great Barr Hall is a grade II listed gothic revival mansion lying in 170 acres of historic parkland on the greenbelt between Birmingham, Sandwell and Walsall. I grew up in the area and as a local resident I have always been interested ...
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The most common rationale for the preservation of buildings of the recent past was voiced by Joe Holyoak in his opening remarks for this conference on Brutalist architecture in Birmingham on the 28th of June. He described these buildings as at present ...
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Discovering Birmingham’s extensive collection of beautiful terracotta buildings. Red, bold, ornate and beautiful…these are some of the words which spring to my mind when I see the striking Victoria Law Courts on Corporation Street built in 1891. For me, it is the material which provides the ...
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I couldn’t continue my intermittent Arts and Crafts series without mentioning Bournville, the model village cum garden suburb that Pevsner describes as “perhaps the fullest expression of Arts and Crafts ideals” in Birmingham. On a personal level, I have a strong connection ...
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On Saturday, along with a group of other BCT supporters and volunteers, I walked the Lozells and East Handsworth Heritage Trail. Organised by Legacy West Midlands with assistance from the Heritage Lottery Fund and the City Council, it aims to raise awareness ...
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Last Sunday volunteers and supporters of The Birmingham Conservation Trust were invited for a tour of Winterbourne House & Gardens which is situated in the University of Birmingham Campus. Winterbourne House is an Edwardian house built in 1903 for the Nettlefold family who were industrialists ...
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William Henry Bidlake was probably the foremost Birmingham architect of the Arts and Crafts era. Yet, despite being known in his own time as “the man who rebuilt Birmingham” and being responsible for three of the city’s 22 Grade I listed buildings, ...
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Along with a handful of other Birmingham Conservation Trust volunteers, trustees and members – including former BCT Director Elizabeth Perkins, who started the project over a decade ago – yesterday I had the privilege of a ‘hard hat’ tour of the work ...
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