During the 1950s and 60s, there was a growing interest in high-rise, high-density housing as a solution to Britain’s housing problems and the need to build more new homes. The 1956 Housing Act also provided subsidies to Local Councils that encouraged the development of high-rise housing: the higher the block, the greater the subsidy. In 1958, the Ministry of Housing and Local Government published a guide to the design of high-rise housing called Flats and Houses, 1958: Design and Economy.
The 1958 guide contains example floor plans for residential tower blocks together with detailed costings (which are now obviously out-of-date). Interestingly, the guide acknowledges that
“…the achievement of a low overall average cost per dwelling in a layout at high density depends upon keeping to a minimum the proportion of high building.”
Today, it’s much more widely understood that high density housing doesn’t inevitably equate to high-rise living and that low- and mid-rise forms of housing can match and exceed the densities of high-rise residential blocks (and cost less). Of course, all of this is dependent on the layout and size of a site.
Landscaping is of particular importance with high-rise residential developments. As the caption for this photo from the 1958 guide states "The large tree brings the tall building into scale with it's surroundings. Ackroydon Estate, Princes Way, Wandsworth."
By the end of the 1960s, high-rise living had fallen out of favour with the British public. Here, for example, is what the RIBA Book of British Housing (2008) has to say on the subject
“Initially, high rise was accepted as people enjoyed modern facilities within the home for the first time. However, few people warmed to the modernist images. The rejection was heightened by the sheer size and scale of many of the schemes. There were also serious problems of noise transmission between dwellings. People felt isolated and flats above ground level were clearly unsuitable for families with children.”
…
“The unpopularity of high-rise development at the end of the 1960s lead to a change in direction. Housing forms were sought that accommodated families at ground level in dwellings with gardens, with other dwellings above. Some solutions were ingenious but the over-complex forms required more sophisticated maintenance techniques which local authorities had difficulty in providing.”
Here are some scans of the example floor plans from the 1958 guide.
11 storey tower block, 2 stairs, 2 lifts, 4 flats per floor
The cruciform shape of this layout is something rarely seen in tower-block designs today, but it gives each flat plenty of natural light and even the common hall benefits from daylighting and cross-ventilation. However, the cruciform shape requires a larger amount of external walling in comparison to rectangular building shapes and thus a higher cost. Click the image for a more detailed floor plan.
11 storey tower block with enclosed common hall access, 2 stairs, 2 lifts, 4 flats per floor
The 1958 guide states that this layout is cheaper to build than the cruciform design as much less external walling is required and the common access space is smaller. Click the image for a more detailed floor plan.
11 storey tower block with windowless bathrooms, 2 stairs, 2 lifts, 4 flats per floor
Internal bathrooms (i.e. windowless bathrooms) allow for more compact floor plans. The 1958 guide also states that the savings from more compact floor space and less external walling outweigh the cost of providing artificial ventilation in the bathrooms. Click the image for a larger, more detailed floor plan.
On the whole, I find the layouts above to be well-designed, although the flat layouts from the 1949 Housing Manual are superior in my view. Placing each flat on a corner of the tower block means that some cross-ventilation is possible in each flat and that none of the flats will be purely north-facing.
As always, it’s instructive to compare these designs, published over 50 years ago, with what’s built today; and to wonder why these layouts (which were certainly designed with economy of construction in mind) are better than the layouts in many recently built residential blocks.
On the subject of high rise blocks being subsidised the higher they went (from 1956) I recently discovered the reason. From The Five Giants by Nicholas Timmins p.184
Duncan Sandys MP
Thank you for another good article on public housing.
Thank you for that quote. I presume there was a strong belief in the 1950s that high-rise housing would provide a greater number of homes in more compact space than building low- or mid-rise housing blocks and that was seen as something to be encouraged.