A History of High-Rise Council Flats in the Black Country

LIVING IN THE SKY
A HISTORY OF HIGH-RISE COUNCIL FLATS IN
THE BLACK COUNTRY
FREE PUBLICATION
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This is a small book but it represents a much
bigger project – a project which has only been
possible with the help and support from dozens
of individuals and organisations. Groups which
supported the original idea included Sandwell
Community Information and Participation
Service, Walsall Tenants and Residents
Association and Wolverhampton Federation
Tenants of Tenants’ Associations, all of whom
were partners to the project funding bid. I’m
grateful to Corinne Miller at Wolverhampton
Art Gallery, Amanda Smith at English
Heritage, Ros Watkiss at Wolverhampton
University, Malcolm Dick at Birmingham
University, and Ian Cawood and Chris Upton
at Newman University for their support and
encouragement in the early stages of the
project. My colleagues in Planning Services at
Wolverhampton City Council as well as those
at Wolverhampton Culture, Arts & Heritage
Service were also very helpful.
Of vital importance to the ‘Block Capital’
project, as it became known, was our grant
and we are grateful to Heritage Lottery
Fund for having the confidence to invest
in the idea. The Block Capital project has
subsequently benefitted from the time, energy
and commitment of more than fifty volunteers
whose names are listed on the inside back
cover.
I would also like to thank everyone who has
contributed to our Block Capital digital archive
(details on page 20) by either giving time to
record an oral history interview, providing
images or donating other material. Miles
Glendinning has been particularly helpful in
2
allowing us to use his data and images, as
has Simon Briercliffe in creating a database
of all the high-rise flats in the area. A team of
voluteers has also helped in cataloguing the
archive, and I would like in particular to thank
Jessica Bassam and Dawn Hazlehurst.
The staff of the four public archives services
in the Black Country have also been of great
assistance in providing advice on the project
design, training to volunteers, and helping
during the sourcing of archive images and
other material. Ros Watkiss, Sue Whitehouse
and Harriet Devlin have also provided
invaluable training to volunteers.
I’d particularly like to thank our community
engagement officers, Chaz Mason and José
Forrest-Tennant for their energy, enthusiasm
and patience.
Several people have given me useful feedback
on the draft of this document including Bob
Deacon, Carol Thompson, Cat Fuller, Dawn
Hazlehurst, Marguerite Nugent and Meave
Haughey. As usual, any errors of any kind
remaining in this document are entirely the
responsibility of the author.
Paul Quigley
The distinctly black country network
Wolverhampton Art Gallery
March 2015
CONTENTS
27
DEMOLITION
& RENEWAL
3
A MISREPRESENTED
HISTORY?
33
A WORK-INPROGRESS
5
THE BLACK COUNTRY’S
PART IN THE STORY
37
LIST OF ORAL
HISTORY
INTERVIEWS
7
‘RISING HEAVENWARD’
C
11
‘LIVING IN THE SKY’
39
19
‘IN QUITE A BAD STATE’
41
20
THE BLOCK CAPITAL
ARCHIVE
INDEX
LIST OF
VOLUNTEERS
1
A MISREPRESENTED HISTORY?
It is now half a century since the peak
of tower-block housing construction in
Britain. Over that period millions of people
have lived in high-rise flats.
As you might expect, in a group of this
size there have been different types of
people - some have led difficult lives,
others have been more successful.
Yet the persistent view of the history of
high-rise flats in Britain is one of almost
unmitigated architectural and social
failure.
Top: Three blocks on Parkview
Road, Stowlawn. Approved
by Bilston Municipal Borough
Council in 1963, they were
named after (from the left) the
then leader of the Labour Party,
Hugh Gaitskell, and the wartime
leaders Winston Churchill and
Clem Atlee (Photo taken in 2013
by Matthew Whitehouse,
© Wolverhampton City Council)
Left: Sandbank Estate in
Bloxwich (Walsall), pictured
in 2013, is run by a tenant
management organisation, an
arrangement which the area
has been in the forefront of
developing.
2
As we were writing this, two incidents
illustrated this point. Prince Charles
published his ‘geometric principles’ to
guide the architects of new buildings –
he wrote in a very straightforward way,
without room for doubt, that ‘high-rise
tower blocks alienate and isolate’.
As Prince Charles was writing, a major
UK greetings card manufacturer put on
sale a ‘comedy’ Christmas card which
carried a picture of a high-rise tower
block and suggested all its residents were
in effect workshy, alcoholic criminals.
Recipients of the card were doubtless
expected to laugh out of recognition.
that it is okay to blame any problems
related to British high-rise council housing
on either the idea of high-rise itself or,
alternatively, on the people who (not even
always by choice) have lived in councilbuilt tower blocks.
Our investigation of multi-storey flats
in the Black Country has found a more
complex story. We have found a history in
which high-rise blocks have certainly not
always led to isolation and alienation, and
have sometimes hosted largely happy and
active communities. Indeed, in the history
we have found, the people who lived in
them haven’t always been very different
from those living in other types of social
housing. One of our Facebook followers
summed up a similar view:“I lived in one in late ‘90s for about 3
years. Good neighbours ...not always
the horror stories people perceive
there to be”.
We have found that, although there have
been serious design mistakes, a more
common cause of past failure has been
the way in which the blocks have been
managed.
The card was later withdrawn, but these
events still seemed to support the view
3
In terms of their reputation, tower
blocks have coloured many people’s
views of the whole British social
housing programme, even though they
actually only represent a small fraction
of it. For that reason alone, a better
understanding of their history is not only
important in itself, but also because it
can help us understand how the history
of Council housing more generally
has been represented – or perhaps
misrepresented.
This booklet is based on an archive
created by Block Capital, a community
heritage project conducted in the Black
Country between 2013 and 2015 and
supported by a Heritage Lottery Fund
grant of £52,500. It draws on more
than sixty oral history recordings of
tenants, housing officers, planners and
construction workers, as well as more
than 300 photographs and other historical
documents.
A large part of the project’s work was
completed by volunteers - people who
were willing to give their own time out
of commitment to the preservation - or
rediscovery - of this history.
The Black Country’s
part in the story
In some ways the history of high-rise
in the Black Country is like other large
urban areas in Britain. But there are key
differences.
The Black Country has more residents
than Birmingham but it is not a city. It
does not have the same urban structure
as, for example, Manchester, Leeds
or Glasgow. Rather than having one
centre, it is a network of towns on a
disused coalfield. This has affected the
development of its public housing in
general, and particularly the construction
of high-rise flats.
Each Black Country town has,
historically, had its own local authority
and many of these commissioned highrise housing schemes, often with different
approaches.
City centre land-values have not
generally applied. But there have
been the extra costs of making large
areas of derelict ex-colliery land fit for
development.
There have not generally been the large
outlying estates created by some cities,
but rather they have been within the
urban area. They have included many
scattered blocks built in isolation or in
pairs.
In the early 1960s the press were still using the word ‘skyscrapers’
to describe the nine-storey blocks at Lakefield Road, Wednesfield.
These would later be dwarfed by buildings more than twice as high.
Wolverhampton Chronicle, August 1962 (Courtesy Wolverhampton
Archives and Local Studies)
4
Lastly, in the late 20th century, some
important government attempts to take
public housing in the Black Country out of
local authority control were withdrawn in
the face of local opposition
5
‘RISING HEAVENWARD’
1930-55
Top: Arthur Greenwood was
the Labour Minister who, in
1930, announced the first
subsidy for multi-storey flats.
Ten years later after his death
he was commemorated in
the name of Bilston’s first
high-rise tower block and, a
year later, his son Anthony
Greenwood would visit the
Black Country to preside at
the official opening of the flats
at Bolton Court, Tipton.
Right: Arthur Greenwood
Court, Bilston (Photo taken in
2013 by Matthew Whitehouse,
© Wolverhampton City
Council)
6
Plans to build high-rise flats arose at a
time of a desperate need for new homes.
In mid-20th century Britain the public
authorities responsible for urban areas
were faced with the task of re-housing
thousands of families from substandard
Victorian accommodation. In 1948,
for example, more than twenty three
thousand houses in the central Black
Country alone were identified as ‘property
which should be condemned’, more than
one in every five homes in the area. On
top of this, nearly half a million British
homes had been destroyed by war in the
1940s.
It is often assumed that the expectation
that these homes would be replaced,
coupled with the lack of available space,
pushed local authorities to build upwards.
In fact, there were other economic forces
at play - in particular central government
subsidies.
As early as 1930, the then Minister of
Health, Arthur Greenwood, announced
that a payment would be made from
the Exchequer to allow the building of
‘tenements’ above three storeys on
expensive land. He said:
“Much as I would prefer to see our
population spreading out rather than
rising heavenward in their dwellings,
one has to face the fact that, for
a limited number of our people…
tenement provision must be made”
Later, Aneurin Bevan’s Housing Act in
1946 also added a specific subsidy for
lift construction. So, both before and
after the war, these subsidies would
have influenced discussions in the Black
Country and elsewhere about what kind
of housing should replace the Victorian
streets earmarked for clearance.
Multi-storey flats had already been
pioneered in continental Europe before
the war. Britain followed, with more than
eighty blocks having been approved in
London by 1948.
In 1952, the only residential high-rise
flats which had been approved by any
English local authority outside London or
the South East were in Birmingham, an
example being the (still surviving) flats at
Duddeston. But by the mid-1950s tower
blocks were starting to gain approval in
most other English regions.
7
With more than four thousand highrise flats approved by 1957, the
West Midlands region had the largest
concentration outside the South
East. Three quarters of these were
in Birmingham, but there were also
approvals in the Black Country.
The first in the Black Country, in 1953,
were a set of six-storey blocks on the
Yew Tree estate (later overlooked by the
junction of the M5 and M6 motorways),
closely followed in 1954 by two much
higher eleven-storey blocks on the top of
Cape Hill, Smethwick (opposite).
The twin blocks of Boulton
Place and Murdock Place
on Suffrage Street were
approved by Smethwick
Council in 1954. These
images were taken by Joe
Russell ten years later
and are reproduced with
permission of Sandwell
Community History &
Archives Service. On the
bottom right the chimneys
of the flats’ open fireplaces
are visible and, in the centre,
the playground referred to by
Marianne Monro
(see page 9).
8
However, it is probably fair to say that
there was not a clamour to build high-rise
flats in the Black Country. The two blocks
on Cape Hill, Murdock Place and Boulton
Place, stood as the tallest residential
buildings in (what is now) the Borough of
Sandwell for several years. Their hilltop
position would have not only have given
their residents a commanding view of
both Birmingham and the Black Country
but also made them a very visible symbol
of a new age in housing design.
Murdock Place and Boulton Place,
named after local manufacturers, had
been designed as a pair of blocks with
a public open space between them. But
there were plans afoot to construct much
larger planned landscapes of multistorey housing. In 1955, on the other
side of the Black Country, the Borough
of Wolverhampton had just issued its
annual handbook to housing tenants with
a futuristic impression of the Dale Street
flats, a twelve acre development which
included the Borough’s first high-rise.
In fact, the next two decades - between
the mid-1950s and the mid-1970s - saw
the construction of all the Black Country’s
high-rise council housing. As in the rest
of the UK, it was a change in national
housing policy which triggered this.
Except, as it happens, their design wasn’t
all new. Today it seems to clash with our
ideas about what is ‘modern’ but the flats
in these blocks were heated by open
coal fireplaces. Marianne Monro lived in
Murdock Place as a child and (in 2014)
described the heating arrangements:
“We had a coal fire, it was really odd. I
didn’t think it was odd at the time, but
looking back I’m thinking how did that
happen?”
9
‘LIVING IN THE SKY’
1956-75 The boom in high-rise construction was
in large measure due to the Conservative
Government’s 1956 Housing Subsidies
Act. This strengthened the payments to
local authorities for multi-storey housing
first put in place a generation before.
It is not clear whether the County Borough
of Wolverhampton foresaw this change,
but work started at the same time on
Dale Street. This was the first post-war
reconstruction of an area so close to the
town centre and, unlike the flats on Cape
Hill, it was also an all-electric affair.
Dale Street flats were Wolverhampton’s
first high-rise and their opening in 1958
illustrated the very mixed feelings there
were to elevated living. The sculptor
Charles Wheeler spoke at the opening
ceremony and seemed to express the
view that flats were inevitable rather than
necessarily a good thing:
“I am a Victorian and I am not
altogether sure that the absence of the
little backyard and a little garden is an
advantage. But we have to move with
the times.”
Top: The Graiseley Estate on Dale Street close to its opening in 1958
(courtesy of Wolverhampton Homes).
There were also reports that, at least
among existing tenants, there was no
great desire to swap their house for a
flat. Of all Wolverhampton tenants at the
time, only 40 responded to an invitation to
apply for a flat on the estate.
An artist’s impression of Dale Street
(from: Martin Cook, ‘Building recording
at Wulfruna Court and Grange Court,
Dale Street, Wolverhampton’ 2007)
10
The estate included three eleven storey
‘point’ blocks (equalling the height of the
Cape Hill flats) and two ‘slab’ blocks - the
latter with exterior deck access on each
11
Top: Dale Street flats in 1958
(Courtesy Wolverhampton
Archives & Local Studies).
Bottom: St Marks Road,
Tipton in May 1969. On the
right of the road are Jellico
and Beatty Houses and,
in the far distance, Bolton
Court (image by Alan Price,
courtesy Keith Hodgkins)
floor. This also maximised the number
of flats accessing the lift, thereby getting
most return on the available subsidy.
Along with the Yew Tree Development in
West Bromwich, Dale Street was among
the first high-rise estates in the Black
Country. But, by the end of the 1950s, the
use of multi-storey flats in a wider process
of house building had spread to several
nearby authorities - including Oldbury,
Smethwick, Tipton, and Walsall.
The County Borough of West Bromwich
continued to be the most active. By the
end of 1959, it had approved at least 18
blocks, mostly on the Yew Tree Estate.
They were not particularly tall - mostly six
or eight storeys - but they represented
a prolific collaboration with two building
firms, Wates and Wimpey, in a way which
mimicked Birmingham. Wates would
become the largest local builder of highrise - described as a ‘trusty mainstay’ of
Black Country boroughs - and erecting
two fifths of all blocks in the area.
Wates’ Midlands subsidiary operated an
unusual approach to the production of
prefabricated parts. Most constructors
would deliver these from regional
production locations. Wates on the other
hand liked to operate ‘factories on site’.
Another early Wates commission in the
Black Country was the construction of
two eight-storey blocks on Green Lane,
Walsall. With the addition of four later
blocks, this would become known as the
Burrowes Street estate.
opened it to influence from outside the
region. One still tantalising link is the one
between West Bromwich’s commissioning
of the Charlemont Farm estate (starting
in 1960) and the development at Meaux,
near Paris, which had opened the
previous year. Whatever the full story, the
physical resemblance was striking.
In any case, members of Black Country
councils were inspired by visits to
London and Birmingham. After seeing
15-storey blocks in Hackey a Halesowen
councillor said it “made his own authority,
which thought it was progressive, look
like a snail which had lost its way”.
Thus, by 1964, councils in the south
and west of the Black Country had also
started approving tower blocks, joining
Wolverhampton and those bordering
Birmingham. Along with Halesowen, these
newcomers included Brierley Hill, Dudley,
Rowley Regis and Stourbridge.
Meanwhile in the north, Willenhall,
Wednesfield, Aldridge-Brownhills and
Bilston all built their first high-rise in the
first half of the 1960s, the latter naming
it’s first block after the former Minister,
Arthur Greenwood. Only Coseley,
Sedgley and Wednesbury held out - the
latter finally approving two blocks in 1966.
In 1964 more than half of all council
housing built in Britain was flats, and this
was also the peak year for high-rise in the
Black Country - twenty-eight blocks were
completed and a further twenty-five new
blocks were approved.
Clearly, the Black Country’s use of
national and international contractors
12
13
However, despite all this activity, in a
wider national debate the tide was now
turning against high-rise. This culminated
in the subsidy regime for high-rise being
ended in 1967 by Harold Wilson’s first
Labour Government.
This fundamental change in approach
came some months before the event
which, for many, now symbolises the end
of the tower block era. The disaster at
Ronan Point, London in 1968 (when an
18th floor gas explosion destroyed one
side of a block), is now iconic, but it did
not itself cause the end of tower block
construction - that was already underway.
For a short period at least, a few high-rise
continued to be built after both the cut
in subsidies and Ronan Point. Between
1967 and 1968 Smethwick started
building four towers of more than twenty
storeys - ultimately some of the Black
Country’s tallest.
Wolverhampton had in any case already
started building what became the area’s
largest concentration of high-rise, the
Heath Town estate, including four twentystorey blocks. Designed by the Borough
Architect and built by Wates, it replaced
the old Victorian heart of the town with a
new, Modernist village.
The estate consisted of both low and
high-rise blocks as well as communal
facilities - a shopping centre, pub,
school, and coal-powered boiler house
which heated all the properties in the
development. Officially opened in 1969,
it came more or less at the end of the
building of multi-storey council flats and,
along with the Chapel Street development
in Brierley Hill stands as the largest
cluster of high-rise in the Black Country.
Indeed, only four blocks were approved
in the Black Country in the 1970s: two by
Wolverhampton in the suburb of Whitmore
Reans; and the last high-rise council
flats in the Black Country, Alma and Leys
Courts in Darlaston which were approved
by Walsall in 1973.
In all, 275 high-rise blocks were built by
Black Country councils. Although this
was far fewer than Birmingham (458), it
represented a third of all high-rise blocks
in the West Midlands. Furthermore,
it was more than the total for three
English regions (East Anglia, the East
Midlands and the South West) and Wales
combined.
The French Connection? Flats at Charlemont Farm (top), approved by West
Bromwich County Borough n the early 1960s, compared with those at Meaux,
near Paris, opened in 1959 (Sources: www.skyscrapercity.com and
http://astudejaoublie.blogspot.co.uk).
14
15
Top: Joe Russell’s shot of
children playing outside
Boulton Place (from: ‘Alton
Douglas presents Joe Russell’s
Smethwick’, 1984, Streetly
Printing)
Bottom: Ann Worth and her
daughter Tracy in their flat on
the 4th floor of Moorlands Court,
Rowley Regis. Tracy has been
a Block Capital project volunteer
(image courtesy Mrs Ann Worth)
In the period since the 1950s, thousands
of Black Country families had been given
a new perspective on their neighbourhood
as they moved from houses to high-rise
flats.
Part of the early criticism of multistorey flats, and which led in part to
the termination of the subsidy, was that
flats were being used to accommodate
young children in a way they were never
intended to. According to this argument,
flats should be used to meet a (newly
discovered) post-war demand to provide
homes for households of one or two
adults, or for families with older children.
Young families on the other hand were
expected to be accommodated in, for
example, the maisonettes often built
alongside high-rise.
“…they designed (the flats) with a
play area with a swing and slide…
and it was always ruined…but all the
kids would come together… about a
hundred of us, and we’d play hide and
seek… or this thing called thunder
and lightning where we’d knock on
someone’s door and run”
Kids in tower blocks were even depicted
on TV when, in 1969, the animation
‘Mary, Mungo & Midge’ was screened on
BBC1. Brendan Hawthorne, who lived in
a 7th floor flat, felt it was an attempt to
normalise the idea of children in high-rise:
“I think it was a actually a cartoon that
was made to get kids to appreciate
the tower block and to associate with
where they lived”
Whatever the wider intention, young
children did live in Black Country
high-rise. Kevin Aston and Brendan
Hawthorne, both lived as children in the
Bolton Court flats in Tipton from the mid
1960s. Kevin was thrilled by moving in:
People who lived in flats as adults during
this period are also known to talk about
it in positive terms. Winifred Shelly was
the first person to move into Highfields
Court, Wolverhampton when it opened in
November 1967.
“I was so chuffed about it that I went to
school the one day, and I brought three
of my school teachers home to show
them the flats – much to my mum’s
surprise.”
“Well we liked living in the sky”
After 48 years, she still lives in the same
flat.
A six year-old Marianne Monro lived in a
9th floor flat in Smethwick with her sister
in the early 1970s:
16
17
Top: Juanita Williams
celebrates Christmas in her
flat on the Lion Farm estate in
Oldbury in the early 1970s.
‘IN QUITE A BAD STATE’
1976-1995
Bottom: Lion Farm in
the 1990s (©Rob Clayton
Photographer / www.
lionfarmestate.co.uk).
Although many high-rise blocks continued
to be well-maintained and appreciated by
their residents, the 1970s is the period
in which some felt that the longer-term
problems started to appear.
In the context of growing homelessness
and unemployment some estates started
to house tenants with deeper social
problems, and the disaffection which
accompanied them affected the blocks’
wider reputation. It has also been argued
that these problems were seized upon
and exaggerated by the tabloid media
which had little sympathy for the ideals of
social housing.
Whatever the cause, it affected tenants
who had previously been comfortable
in high-rise blocks. Dave Woodhall had,
since 1965, lived on the 9th floor of the
17-storey Ryder House in West Bromwich
and described it as ‘a nice place to grow
up’. However his family had moved out by
1983:
“the flats were going downhill…
it wasn’t a pleasant place to live
anymore… we knew less and less of
the people who had moved in…the
neighbour was anti-social, a notorious
violent drunk”
18
Lack of maintenance, vandalism and
offensive behaviour, the break-up of the
first generation of occupants and/or the
arrival of newcomers have all been cited
as features of the onset of low demand
and stigmatisation. The poor reputation
of some estates fed a spiral of decline
and, in some places a ‘ghettoisation’.
This prompted a discussion of who or
what was to blame including, as has been
mentioned, the idea that high-rise housing
was always doomed to failure.
In this context, the Thatcher
Government’s introduction of ‘Right to
Buy’ (RTB) in 1980 was the first and most
notorious move to encourage the transfer
of housing stock out of local council
control. Councils had always been able to
sell their houses (indeed the Conservative
chair of Wolverhampton’s housing
committee was advocating as much in
1969), but until RTB they could not be
forced to do so. Combined with a decline
of council house building, RTB led to a
shrinking public housing stock overall and
also an imbalance - more houses than
flats were bought.
Continued on page 22
19
LOCATIONS OF TOWER BLOCKS IN THE
BLACK COUNTRY 1980
THE BLOCK CAPITAL ARCHIVE
SANDWELL
DUDLEY
1954
1955 1956
1958
1965 1967 1968 1969 1973 1975
1980
1980’s
1985 1986
1989
1990
1995
in
io
n
ol
it
ts
F
in irst
th d
e em
Bl o
ac lit
k ion
C s
ou o
nt f h
ry ig
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Ac he
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iti m
a
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H aid tive ent
ea o
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th n
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To pu
te
Sa wn b r
e
Tr n
us dw riot por
te
t a el
d
ba l H
as
nd ou
th
on sin
e
ed g
Ac
tio
n
Data provided by Simon Briercliffe,
based on the publication ‘Tower Block’
(1994) by Miles Glendinning and
Stephan Muthesius
L
th ate
e s
Bl t h
ac ig
k hC ris
ou e
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1946 1953
WALSALL
‘D
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1945
WOLVERHAMPTON
See the catalogue of the archive
by visiting distinctlyblackcountry.
org.uk/blockcapital/archive or by
emailing distinctlyblackcountry@
wolverhampton.gov.uk or, if you live in
the Black Country, by asking at your local
public archives.
G
co ov
ns ern
tru m
ct en
i
Ap on t su
in p
bs
r
Bl ov
id
is
ac a
es
k lo
C
f
lif
Fi
ou firs
t
Bl rst
nt t 6
ac 1
r
y
s
1
k -s
to
C to
re
ou r
y
nt ey
fla
ry b
ts
lo
ck
s
G
bu
hi ov
ilt
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in
-ri nm
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bo nt s
W
hi olv om ub
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si
di
-ri rh
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se am
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te
s ’s fi
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t
It is all material collected by volunteers or
donated to the project. It includes more
than 150 items, including photos, official
guidebooks, such as the one marking
the opening of the Bolton Court flats
(pictured),
as well as
municipal tenants’
handbooks.
It includes
testimony from
people who
have lived in or
who have had
experience of
high-rise blocks such
as Dave Cocker
(pictured). You can
also listen to some
of our interviews with
current and former
residents on our oral
history webpage,
Sharing Storeys.
The archive also includes council reports
which led to the demolition of many tower
blocks. It features a list of all 275 tower
blocks built in the Black Country based on
the one published by Miles Glendinning
and Stefan Muthesius in their book ‘Tower
Block’ (pictured), and mapped opposite.
W
hi ils
gh on
-ri G
se o
Ex su ver
b nm
fla p
ts los sid en
in ion y t
en
E
ds
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The archive is a collection of digital
resources on the subject of the history
of high-rise council housing in the Black
Country since the 1960s.
2000
2011
2005
2015
TIMELINE
20
21
Left: This image taken from the twentystorey Bover Court, Wednesfield in 1976
accompanied a news story about a residents’
protest over a broken lift. The flats had only
been approved for construction eight years
before (courtesy Express and Star).
The complete redevelopment of the site
of these blocks was, for some years at
least, very much an exception. And by no
means all high-rise was in dire straits raising questions about was claimed to be
the inherent hopelessness of multi-storey
flats. In a survey perhaps never to be
repeated, Miles Glendinning and Stefan
Muthesius viewed first-hand all high-rise
blocks in the UK:‘During our own investigations, we
visited all multi-storey blocks of public
housing in the UK, and were surprised
to discover how few were in a state of
serious dilapidation - in contrast to
high flats’ general ‘media image’’
Other initiatives introduced in the
mid-1980s included the Estate Action
Programme, which involved councils
bidding to the (then) Department of the
Environment for funding to improve
council estates. Funds were, for example,
obtained to improve the Burrowes Street
estate in Walsall. Richard Worrell, now
a resident of the estate but a local
22
Councillor at the time, describes how this
became a turning point in the life of the
estate:
“During the ‘80s and ‘90s … it was in
quite a bad state… we used to call this
place ‘The Ice Blocks’…but we were
able to get some progress”
But it was as if this was the start of a
divergence in the journeys taken by
different high-rise blocks in the Black
Country. Some would go on to survive
well into the 21st century, others were
deemed to be beyond salvation. The
first Black Country blocks to be turned
to rubble were among the oldest - the
mid-1980s saw the demolition of Boulton
Place and Murdock Place in Smethwick.
In the Black Country, this media image
was influenced by the reporting of a
disturbance in Heath Town following a
police drugs raid on a local pub in May
1989, reported in the national media as a
‘riot’. Although this may in fact have come
at a turning point in the estate’s fortunes,
it remains shorthand for the decline of the
area and the undesirability of its high-rise.
23
Following the purchase of individual
homes under ‘Right-to-buy’, the
government opened the possibility of
large-scale transfer of council housing to
new landlords. Significantly in the Black
Country, the Secretary of State attempted
a transfer of high-rise and other stock to
a proposed Housing Action Trust (HAT)
on three estates: Lion Farm in Oldbury;
and Cape Hill and Windmill Lane in
Smethwick.
The move was actively opposed by both
tenants and the local authority and was
abandoned as a result. However the
attempt (and the local response to it) left
a mark on both the local skyline and the
organisation of both the tenants and local
housing authority. Much of Lion Farm
was demolished, impetus was given to
the growth of a tenants’ movement in the
Black Country, and a more decentralised
approach to managing council housing
was adopted in the Borough.
Tenant management organisations
(TMOs) started to become significant in
the Black Country in the late 1980s and
early 1990s. In Walsall they were to take
on the management of four high-rise
estates - Chuckery, Burrowes Street,
Leamore and Sandbank. And by the end
of the 1990s there would be eight TMOs
in the area.
Left: Written at almost the end of the
Borough’s high-rise programme, the
1969 tenants’ handbook included several
promotional images of tower blocks including,
on the front cover, three blocks at Merry
Hill flats built two years earlier (Courtesy
Wolverhampton Homes).
24
25
DEMOLITION & RENEWAL
1996-2014
By the mid 1990s the challenges of
high-rise council housing had provided
more fuel for opponents of both multistorey flats and large scale publicallyowned housing in general. The trend
was swinging further towards either the
transfer out of public ownership or, in
the case of high-rise blocks especially,
demolition.
By the end of the twentieth century
37 tower blocks had already been
demolished in the Black Country - the
vast majority by Sandwell Metropolitan
Borough Council. As a housing authority,
Sandwell had never commissioned a
tower block itself, having only come into
existence in 1974. But it was to gain a
national reputation for pulling them down.
In the ‘80s and ‘90s the Borough’s
demolitions had included a large number
of the older multi-storey flats built in the
1950s, including 13 of the original 15
blocks on the Yew Tree estate.
In the years either side of 2000 the residents of Sandwell were frequently disturbed by the
sound of high-rise being detonated. Here onlookers view the explosive demolition of Hamilton
House in Smethwick (Images with kind permission ©Phil Hill)
26
In 1995 the Government returned to the
idea of transferring council housing en
masse to new landlords with the creation
of the Estate Renewal Challenge Fund
(ERCF). Attracted by the promised
funding, Sandwell MBC was one of
the early bidders, although the estates
identified did not include the Borough’s
high-rise. Following a contested ballot
of tenants, the vote to transfer was not
supported and this rejection, like that of
the HAT some years before, would go on
to influence the future ownership of public
housing in the Black Country.
In the same period there were other
transfers in the Black Country - for
example Sanctuary Housing Association
took over the vacant 23-storey Alder
House on the Heath Town estate, since
renaming it Hampton View.
The Labour government’s ‘Decent Homes’
programme from 2000 again spurred
councils to transfer their housing stock
to a new landlord or at least a separate
company to manage it.
The first option was taken by Walsall
Council and in 2003 its entire stock was
passed to two new landlords, Walsall
Housing Group and WATMOS. WATMOS
was a further development of the local
TMOs and it is now landlord for most
of the remaining high-rise blocks in the
Borough.
27
In Sandwell and Wolverhampton stock
transfer was less popular, in part because
of the tenants’ rejection of the HAT and
ERCF in the 1990s, and instead Arms
Length Management Organisations
(‘ALMOs’) were created in 2004 and 2005
respectively. Only Dudley Metropolitan
Borough Council, with the fewest tower
blocks - thirty or so - decided to continue
to own and manage its housing stock.
But by then the vast majority of towerblock demolitions had already been
completed. In the first handful of years of
the 21st century a further 34 blocks had
been demolished. Sandwell still made
the running, disposing of three 17-storey
blocks on the Lyng estate in West
Bromwich, and Jellico and Beatty Houses
in Tipton for example.
But this time Wolverhampton and Walsall
were also in the fray, demolishing eight
and nine blocks respectively. It was the
end of the line for three 1950s blocks
at Blakenhall Gardens and two 1960s
blocks in Darlaston. More surprising
was the demolition in 2001 of Leys and
Alma Courts, the Black Country’s newest
blocks, which had only stood for a little
over 25 years.
This phase of Wolverhampton’s
demolitions had in part been informed
by a study published in 2000. This took
into account tenants’ views on a range of
subjects including the condition of their
flat and block, the reputation of the area,
and community solidarity. The three
Portobello blocks, built by Willenhall
in the early ‘60s and later acquired by
Wolverhampton, scored lowest in the
survey and they were demolished three
years later.
28
A similar review by Sandwell MBC in 2007
recommended consulting with residents
over the demolition of the surviving blocks
of Bolton Court in Tipton and Beaconview
House on the Charlemont Farm estate.
In the event Beaconview survived and
Bolton Court - ‘The Gateway to Tipton’
- finally bit the dust in 2011. This was
the last of more than 60 demolitions by
Sandwell MBC, about half of which have
been carried out by controlled explosion.
Beaconview House is only one example
of a block reprieved from demolition.
Another is St Mary’s Court in Willenhall,
closed by Walsall Council in 1997 and
earmarked for demolition. A change of
plan later saw it sold off instead - it was
refurbished by a private construction
company and re-opened under a new
name, The Pinnacle.
Top Left: Bover Court and
Wodensfield Tower in Wednesfield,
in advance of their recent
refurbishment (Photo by Miles
Glendinning 1987; University of
Edinburgh/Heritage Lottery Fund
‘Tower Blocks’ Project’)
Bottom Left: St Mary’s Court was
closed by Walsall Council in 1997
and earmarked for destruction.
After a review of the economics of
demolition, a change of plan
saw it sold to the private sector
(Photo by Chaz Mason)
29
Indeed, given that a large majority of
1960s tower blocks remain, and that
many of those demolished are not so
dissimilar from those that are left, the
pattern of demolition defies a simple
architectural explanation.
There are however, one or two marked
trends. After Wates, Wimpey was the
construction company most used to build
Black Country high-rise, but Wimpey’s
blocks have not survived as well as those
of other large builders. In fact more than
half of Wimpey’s blocks have gone, in
proportion a loss rate of twice that of
Wates.
In general, and although it is not difficult
to find former occupants who have been
glad to see them come down, the trend
towards demolition has passed. Only two
blocks have been brought down the in
Black Country in the last five years, and
demolition is not now always seen as the
way forward for high-rise flats.
Of those that remain, the experience
of occupants has varied considerably
Wulfruna and Grange Courts were the only high-rise blocks to have been included on Council’s local list
of buildings with architectural or historical interest. They were demolished in 2009.
Right: Image courtesy Dave Cocker
30
between blocks. Some have provided
homes to newcomers to the country: in
the early 2000s for example, Heath Town
drew national attention for the range of
nationalities among the asylum seekers
and refugees housed there. Until the
arrangement was terminated in 2011,
the estate was for some time the largest
single concentration of these groups in
the Black Country.
Partial redevelopment is now proposed
on Heath Town, with the removal of most
of the 1960s deck access and the use
of much of the original green space for
individually heated private housing - thus
diluting the original vision of a communal
boiler facility for the estate.
The last few years have seen some
elements of the older order return. The
arms-length management organisation
‘Sandwell Homes’ returned to direct
council control in 2012 and the first
council housing in Sandwell for decades
was built, as it happened, on the site of a
demolished tower block.
Across the Black Country,
refurbishment supported by the
Decent Homes programme has
transformed many high-rise
blocks, often including brightly
coloured exterior thermal
cladding. This has provided a
sharp contrast to earlier duller
concrete and brick exteriors
but perhaps also, to the casual
observer, disguised their origins
in mid-twentieth century postwar housing crisis.
31
A WORK-IN-PROGRESS
Within this very brief history, lots of
questions remain unanswered about
the story of high-rise council flats.
However, one issue does seem to be
relatively clear: it is difficult to argue that
high-rise flats are inherently doomed or
somehow always ultimately uninhabitable.
While their economics will certainly be
questioned, it is clear that multi-storey
flats can provide some people with a
home they are glad to occupy.
Top: The Chapel Street Estate is the largest
development of high-rise in the south of the Black
Country and on a clear day is visible from the
Malvern Hills, 30 miles away.
Left: The boiler serving the estate-wide district
heating scheme was one of a number of
community facilities designed into the Heath Town
development in the late 1960s.
32
First there is the inconvenient fact that
the Black Country’s tallest residential
building was not built in the 1960s but
much more recently - in the 21st century
in fact. The student accommodation at
Victoria Hall is as tall as any council tower
block built in the area and its existence
seems to suggest that the construction of
new high-rise has not been abandoned by
everyone.
But there are other clues. It might be
true that no other type of social housing
has been demolished at the same rate
as high-rise tower blocks, but often the
low-rise or maisonettes built as part of
the same development have also been
demolished - and sometimes before the
high-rise. This seems to suggest that
problem is one of failed estates rather
than necessarily a failed housing form.
Whether the demolitions were all
absolutely necessary might also be a
question worth asking in the context
of the successful refurbishments (and
reprieves) which have taken place since.
Certainly some of them did not, it seems,
take place in the face of clear demand for
an alternative use of the land. The sites
of former high-rise estates like those at
Portobello and Bolton Court have lain
vacant for years for example.
That said, the stories of urine-in-the-lift,
noise, burnt-out garages, and sky-high
heating bills are not made up. Multi-storey
flats, and no-less those commissioned by
councils in the 1960s can be, and have
been, at times, horrible places to live.
But how then can it be that in the
surveys of tenants’ opinions mentioned
above there can be such a diversity of
responses? While some blocks have been
rife with problems and dissatisfaction,
others have been appreciated and valued.
33
The answer may be in the tenants’
responses themselves. If their concerns
are addressed (and these might include,
for example, some attentive security
system, thermal insulation, timely
maintenance and local facilities) opinions
can be positive.
Top: Tenants celebrate the
refurbishment of Russell House,
Wednesbury in 2012 (Courtesy
Express and Star).
Bottom: Lancaster House,
Rowley Regis in 2008 and 2015,
before and after refurbishment
(Photo on right taken by Matthew
Whitehouse, © Wolverhampton
City Council)
Perhaps the most encouraging story
to emerge from this study is the way in
which tenants and tenants’ organisations
have been able to claim some influence
over the management and ownership of
high-rise flats in the Black Country.
The Black Country has played some part
in this story. Both Sandwell and Walsall
have, for example, gained national
reputations for the achievements of highrise tenants.
But there is some way to go. Not only do
difficult problems in high-rise housing still
persist, but the documented history of
council housing in the Black Country is
littered with unanswered questions. We
hope this study will at least encourage
further exploration of a subject relevant to
the lives of thousands of local people.
If anyone were to read the ‘tenants
handbooks’ issued by Black Country local
authorities in the 1950s and 60s they
could surely only remark that the overtly
paternalistic attitudes they represent now
appear to be from a completely different
age. The fact that they do seem out of
time is in part a tribute to the historic
change in the position of tenants and the
way they are viewed by local authority
housing departments.
Right : St Anne’s Court and, at the rear, St
Giles’ Court were built by Bryant in the early
1960s for Willenhall Urban District Council
(Photo taken in 2013 by Matthew Whitehouse,
© Wolverhampton City Council)
34
35
ORAL HISTORY INTERVIEWS
Heath Town, Wolverhampton in 2012 (Photo taken by Matthew Whitehouse, © Wolverhampton
City Council)
36
Interviewee
Date of Interview Interviewer
Mins. Location
Jessica Archer
K Aston & P Whiting
Tony Bason
James Bunce
Norman Bracken-Ridge
Malcolm Cartridge
Vincent Clarke
Dave Cocker
Victor Collins
Barry Cotgrove Luke Caulton
Elaine Daws
Bob Deacon
Geoff Deakin
V Foster
Thomas Furnival
Brendan Hawthorne
Mavis Hawthorne
June Mary Haydon
Jack Hoult
David Hubball Don Jones
Colin Lewis
Wendy Lloyd Godfrey Minay
Marianne Monro Madeline Moorcroft
Shaun Pritchard
Trevor Purcell
Sandra Purcell
Emma Rennocks
Victor Roden
Winifred Shelley
Elieen Smith
Jean Smith
Dave Spittle
Nicki Statham
Martyn Steed
Peter Thompson Louise Ward
Lynda Whitebeard
Juanita Williams
25 Sept 2014
25 June 2014
21 Feb 2015
28 Jan 2015
29 July 2014
25 Sept 2014
07 Aug 2014
29 July 2014
29 May 2014
20 June 2014
25 Sept 2014
25 Sept 2014
26 Nov 2014
25 June 2014
31 May 2014
25 Sept 2014
06 May 2014
25 June 2014
25 Sept 2014
25 June 2014
24 Feb 2015
31 July 2014
02 July 2014
24 Feb 2015
09 Dec 2014
25 Sept 2014
25 Sept 2014
03 July 2014
14 May 2014
14 May 2014
25 Sept 2014
07 Oct 2014
16 Dec 2014
25 Sept 2014
17 June 2014
25 June 2014
25 Sept 2014
30 May 2014
26 Feb 2015
22 July 2014
25 Sept 2014
09 Oct 2014
4
22
29 24
30
10
15
23
26
20
10
22
24
10
9
11
21
22
12
7
42 15
29
29 4
30
11
10
7
20
7
18
33
6
7
7
13
18
22 32
8
21
T Shelly
T Shelly
R Collins
D Cocker
P Rodwell
D Cocker
D Cocker
C Bason
C Bason
P Rodwell
H Crawford
H Crawford
C Bason
B Dakin
C Bason
D Cocker
P Rodwell
C Bason
D Cocker
B Dakin
P Rodwell
C Bason
T Shelly
C Bason
S Pennell
P Rodwell
A Mohammed
C Bason
P Rodwell
P Rodwell
T Shelly
C Bason
S Pennell
T Shelly
C Bason
T Shelly
D Cocker
C Bason
R Collins
D Cocker
D Cocker
P Rodwell
Burrowes St., Walsall
Bolton Ct., Tipton
Heath Town, W’ton
Graiseley Estate, W’ton
Grosvenor Ct., Wednesfield
Burrowes St., Walsall
Long Ley, Heath Town
Various, W’ton
Longfield Hse., Heath Town
Darley Hse, Rowley Regis
Regent Hse., Burrowes St.
Burrowes St., Walsall
Heath Town
Bolton Ct., Tipton
Heath Town, W’ton
Burrowes St., Walsall
Bolton Ct., Tipton
Bolton Ct., Tipton
Burrowes St., Walsall
Bolton Ct., Tipton
Eve Hill, Dudley
Various
Wilson Hse., Lion Farm
Whitmore Reans
Heath Town, W’ton
Various, Sandwell
Burrowes St., Walsall
Various
St Giles Ct., Rowley Regis
St Giles Ct., Rowley Regis
Burrowes Hse.
Arthur Greenwood Ct
Highfields Ct., W’ton
Burrowes St., Walsall
Heath Town, W’ton
Bolton Ct., Tipton
Burrowes St., Walsall
Heath Town, W’ton
Wychbury Ct., Dudley
Blakenhall Estate, W’ton
Burrowes St., Walsall
Chiltern Hse., Lion Farm
37
Interviewee
Date of Interview Interviewer
Mins. Location
Dave Woodhall
Richard Worrall
A & R Worth
(Anonymous)
(Anonymous)
(Anonymous)
(Anonymous)
(Anonymous)
(Anonymous)
(Anonymous)
(Anonymous)
(Anonymous)
(Anonymous)
(Anonymous)
(Anonymous)
(Anonymous)
02 Oct 2014
25 Sept 2014
3 Feb 2015
06 Aug 2014
06 Aug 2014
10 Aug 2014
25 Sept 2014
10 Aug 2014
18 July 2014
25 Sept 2014
11 Aug 2014
21 May 2014
10 Aug 2014
25 June 2014
07 Oct 2014
25 June 2014
18
11
17 4
8
11
14
21
6
12
22
12
18
7
8
7
P Rodwell
A Mohammed
P Rodwell
T Shelly
T Shelly
C Bason
D Cocker
C Bason
T Shelly
D Cocker
C Bason
T Shelly
C Bason
C Bason
C Bason
T Shelly
Ryder Hse., West Bromwich
Burrowes St., Walsall
Moorlands Court
Bolton Ct., Tipton
Moorlands Ct., Rowley Regis
Heath Town, W’ton
Burrowes St., Walsall
Heath Town, W’ton
Romsley Ct., Queens Cross
Burrowes St., Walsall
Heath Town, W’ton
Darley Hse Rowley Regis
Heath Town, W’ton
Bearwood Hse., Smethwick
Arthur Greenwood Ct., Bilston
Shelley Ave., Tipton
Chervil Rise on the Heath Town estate, Wolverhampton (Photo by Miles Glendinning 1987; University of
Edinburgh/Heritage Lottery Fund ‘Tower Blocks’ Project)
38
INDEX
1930s, 6, 7
1940s, 7, 20
1950s, 7, 9, 11, 17, 20, 25, 27
1960s, 13, 17, 20, 27, 29
1970s, 9, 15, 17, 19, 21
1980s 19, 21, 22, 23, 25
1990s 18, 21, 25, 27-30
2000s, 21, 26-31, 34
2010s, 21, 29, 31, 35
Alder House, 27
Aldridge-Brownhills, 13
Alma Court, Darlaston, 15, 29
ALMOs, see Arms Length Management
Organisations
Aneurin Bevan, 7
Arms Length Management Organisations,
29, 31
Arthur Greenwood, 6, 7, 13, 37
Asylum seekers, 31
Beaconview House, West Bromwich, 29
Beatty House, Tipton, 12, 29
Bilston, 2, 6, 12, 13
Birmingham, 5, 7, 9
Blakenhall Gardens, 27
Bolton Court, Tipton, 12, 17, 20, 21, 29,
33, 37
Boulton Place, 8, 9, 16, 23
Bover Court, Wednesfield, 22, 23, 28
Brierley Hill, 13, 15
Burrowes Street, 13, 22, 25, 37
Cape Hill, 9, 11, 25
Chapel Street, Brierley Hill, 15, 32
Charlemont Farm, 13, 14, 29
Charles Wheeler, 11
Children, 9, 16, 17
Chuckery, 25
Cladding, 31
Clem Atlee Court, Bilston, 2
Coal, 5, 9, 15
Coalfield, 5
Coseley, 13
Criminals, 3
Dale Street, 9-13, See also Graiseley
Darlaston, 15, 21, 29
Decent Homes, 21, 27, 31
Deck access, 11, 31
Demolition, 20, 21, 23, 26, 27, 29-31, 33
By controlled explosion, 26, 29
Dilapidation, 23
Duddeston, 7
Dudley, 13, 21, 29
East Anglia, 15
East Midlands, 15
Estate Renewal Challenge Fund, 27, 29
Estate Action, 21, 22
Families, 7, 17
Government, 5, 7, 11, 15, 19, 20, 21,
25, 27
Graiseley estate, Wolverhampton, 10,
20, 37, See also Dale Street
Grange Court, Wolverhampton, 10, 11, 30
Green Lane, Walsall, 13
Hackey, 13
Halesowen, 13
Hamilton House, Smethwick, 26
Hampton View, 27
Harold Wilson, 15
HAT, See Housing Action Trust
Heath Town, 15, 20, 21, 23, 27, 31, 37, 38
Heating, 9, 32, 33
Highfields Court, 17
Housing Action Trust, 21, 25, 27
Hugh Gaitskell Court, Bilston, 2
Jellico House, Tipton, 12, 29
Land-values, 5
Leamore, 25
Leys Court, Darlaston, 15, 29
Lift construction, 7
Lion Farm, 18, 25, 37
London, 7, 13, 15, 20
39
Maisonettes, 17, 33
Mary, Mungo & Midge, 17
Merry Hill flats, Wolverhampton, 24, 25
Miles Glendinning, 23
Modernist, 15
Murdock Place, 8, 9, 23
Neighbours, 3, 19
Newcomers, 13, 19
Oldbury, 13, 18, 25
Paris, 13
The Pinnacle, 29
‘Point’ blocks, 11
Portobello, 29
Prefabricated parts, 13
Private housing, 28, 29, 31
Public open space, 9
Refugees, 31
Reputation of high-rise, 5, 19, 29
Right-to-buy, 19, 23, 25
Ronan Point, 15
Rowley Regis, 13
Russell House, Wednesbury, 34
Ryder House, 19
Sanctuary Housing Association, 27
Sandbank, 2, 25
Sandwell, 8, 9, 21, 25- 27, 29, 31, 35, 37
School, 15, 17
Sedgley, 13
Smethwick, 9, 11, 15, 17, 20, 23, 25,
26, 38
South West, 15
St Mary’s Court, 29
Stefan Muthesius, 20, 23
Stock transfer, 27
Stourbridge, 13
Stowlawn, Bilston, 2
Subsidies, 11
Subsidy by government, 7, 11, 15, 17
Tenant management organisations, 2,
23, 25
Tenants, 2, 5, 9, 11, 19, 20, 25, 27, 29
Thatcher, 19
40
The Lyng estate, 29
The Pinnacle, 27
Tipton, 6, 11, 12, 13, 17, 29, 37
TMOs, See Tenant Management
Organisations
Victorian, 7, 11, 15
Wales, 15
Walsall, 2, 11, 13, 15, 21, 22, 25, 27,
29, 35, 37, 38
Walsall Housing Group, 27
War, 7, 11, 17
Wates, 13, 15, 31
WATMOS, 27
Wednesbury, 13, 34
Wednesfield, 13
West Bromwich, 11, 13, 19, 29
West Midlands, 9, 15
Whitmore Reans, 15
Willenhall, 13, 29
Wimpey, 13, 31
Winston Churchill Court, Bilston, 2
Wodensfield Tower, Wednesfield, 22,
23, 28
Wolverhampton, 9, 11, 13, 15, 17, 19, 29
Wulfruna Court, Wolverhampton, 10,
11, 30
Yew Tree, 9, 11, 25
VOLUNTEERS
The Block Capital project volunteers have been: Andrew Howlett; Andy Lopez; Anna
Silvani; Ben Hall; Brendan Hawthorne; Brian Dakin; Chris Parsons; Christine Bason;
Clive Wilson; Damian Hansford; Dave Cocker; David Burbidge; Dawn Hazlehurst;
Derek Woodmass; Elaine Powney; Eve Phillips; Glenys Roberts; Greg Worwood;
Hannah Crawford; James Yates; Jessica Bassam; Julie Wilde; Kari Nyakunu; Kate
Gomez; Leah Bond; Lewis Barton; Louise Thomas; Luke Price; Marian Innes; Mary
Cartwright; Mary Collins; Matthew Terry; Matthew Whitehouse; Morgan Miller; Nicholas
Banda; Pat Rodwell; Phillip Pennell; Ray Parton; Rosalind Watkiss; Roxie Collins; Ruth
Beardsmore; Sal Pennell; Shaun Pritchard; Simon Briercliffe; Stephen King; Susan
Dangor; Susan Woolnough Holt; Tony G. Bason; Tracy Shelly; Victoria Hillman; and
Wendy Lloyd.
LIVING IN THE SKY
A HISTORY OF HIGH-RISE COUNCIL FLATS IN
THE BLACK COUNTRY
The Block Capital Project
A Participative History of High Rise Council Flats
A distinctly black country project, supported by Heritage Lottery Fund
In association with Sandwell Community Information and Participation Service, Walsall Tenants
and Residents Association and Wolverhampton Federation Tenants of Tenants’ Associations.
Copies of this booklet can be obtained by contacting:
Wolverhampton Art Gallery
WAVE (Wolverhampton, Arts, Venues, Experiences)
Wolverhampton WV1 1DU
distinctlyblackcountry@wolverhampton.gov.uk