Access to Eden
The Rise and Fall of Public
Sector Housing Ideals in Britain
by John Astley
A publication under the imprint of INFORMATION ARCHITECTS
ONLINE BOOKSELLERS:
- Amazon.co.uk, etc. . .(click on link below)
ISBN: 978-0-9556638-3-3
PUB DATE: 1 March
2010
THEMES:
Public Sector Housing in the 20th century.
Architecture, Arts and Crafts values, Garden City ideals, Unwin and Parker, Ebenezer Howard, 1924 Housing Act, John Wheatley and ''Homes Fit for Heroes'.
CATEGORY: Social Sciences/Architecture/Urban Planning
AVAILABILITY: in English, UK & worldwide.
OVERVIEW:
In Access to Eden, John Astley explores the influences that shaped the original public sector housing ideals in Britain.
The essay surveys the cultural and legislative strands in a story that is at once beguiling, but which ultimately reveals the impact on housing ideals of the Arts and Crafts movement with architects such as Baillie Scott, urban planners such as Ebenezer Howard, and after the 1914-18 War the “homes fit for heroes” Housing Acts of the 1920s, which empowered local authorities of the day to take action on the housing front.
As a case study, the author selects the Merry Oak housing development in Bitterne, Southampton, to examine the practical outcome of the ideals that had been established by the 1924 Housing Act of John Wheatley.
John Astley concludes this essay with an epilogue on public sector housing in the present era, and finds a landscape of confusion: a rapacious private sector with both eyes on the bottom line; and a plethora of budget-crazed agencies and quangos operating in the bizarre vacuum left by the retreat of local government in the face of centralization. Is it really too late, though, for local government to regain the moral high ground and deliver value for money?
After reading Access to Eden, you won’t be able to look at a house, any house, in quite the same way again.
QUOTE:
" . . . In less than a century, we seem to have moved from an ethos of “Homes fit for heroes” to public sector housing as a system of distributed welfare in non-workhouses and the awful reality of ‘sink’ housing estates. Alarmingly, the subject does not appear to be up for discussion. The time has come, then, to engage in a healthy debate on the bigger picture of housing provision in Britain in this early twenty-first century."
- From Access to Eden
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AUTHOR:
John Astley
is a sociologist, writer, lecturer - and is a frequent
contributor to journals, conferences, and radio talks.
As a sociologist, he is also the author of three volumes
of collected essays: Liberation
& Domestication, Culture
& Creativity, and Professionalism &
Practice - as well as Why
Don't We Do It in the Road, a monograph on The
Beatles Phenomenon.
John Astley's most recent book is
Herbivores
and Carnivores - selected essays
looking at the struggle for cultural values
in Society.
BOOKSELLERS: Publisher-Direct
prices from INGRAM.
Our wholesalers for UK and Europe include Gardners,
Bertram.
LIBRARIES: This title available in PAPERBACK ONLY
and is attainable through the usual library services companies.
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COPY:
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Thank you for your interest.
The Editors
INFORMATION ARCHITECTS
Posted: 1 March 2010
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