We need an equivalent of “turn in one’s grave” for those who are cremated. I suggest “churn in one’s urn.” It rhymes! 😜 Your analysis is spot on. The tower blocks are vertical neighbourhoods. A private corridor on the 18th floor is the same as a public street on the surface. Both need to be cared for constantly, whether it’s a hole in the carpet or in the asphalt. It’s a shame that councils built these lofty towers with lofty standards but never did basic maintenance. It’s a sin because it reinforces the stereotypes about the working classes, that they can’t take care of things, that’s it’s all they deserve. A tower block is like a model with a muscle body: they’re high maintenance. The difference between a proletarian project and a bourgeois condominium isn’t architectural, it’s TLC. One can easily turn into the other and back again.
Trellik Tower used to have the loveliest coloured glass panels covering the back wall of the entrance. They were removed at some point and I felt that really took away from the soul of this great beast of a building.
We were one of the first families to move into Trellick back in '72. I was very young & was shielded from a lot of the social problems that I only really became aware of after we left. I do remember the surrounding area being extremely grim at the time & of being nervous when playing in the playgrounds beneath - since dismantled along with the garages & other walkways - due to objects raining down from above at times plus the long walks up the stairs when the lifts broke down. Great views though! I still pass by occasionally & always look up at our old flat.
Trellick sounds like a Cornish name.I went in the Trellick Tower about 2000 to the top floor to enjoy the views across London. Imagine living high up during the great storm of 1987.
Those buildings look less like a jail but still looks harsh. It sort of makes me think of a futuristic soviet thing. I really like the fact that he lived in one of the buildings for a while after if was finished.
Yeah Brutalism wasn't designed to look friendly and warm. I like the idea behind it a whole lot more than the façade. Him living there if only for two months was indeed praiseworthy, even if he was apparently an unfriendly man in general, according to part 1.
Not surprising considering it was the communist ideology that ultimately (trough a few evolution's) lead down this path of architecture that we are still struggling with today.
The reason why it is all do high up is because the idea was to save money, water and the like would be able to move down to the flats through gravity. This means that you would have to pump it less.
Getting addicted to these vids and watching all the previous ones back to back. Just brilliant and so informative. Our head office is in London and I can’t wait to explore these places when we’re allowed back. Keep it up 👍🏻
Having lived in Russian cities usually comprised solely of tower blocks of various sizes (good luck to you if you can do something with a shape of a shoe box), I find these towers' architecture sinister and forbidding. They look aggressive and almost dystopian to me. As if it was a set piece from Clockwork Orange or something similarly Ridley Scott inspired. Russian tower blocks may be more basic and less architecturally imposing, but they don't give you this shiver down the spine, they are more friendly and less brutal, if you excuse the expression... And, dear Jago, please keep making these. You videos make my teatime even mare enjoyable. Thanks a ton for your work!
The Stalinka apartments were architecturally speaking easy on the eye. On the other hand the Khrushchyovka used an ugly prefabricated concrete panel construction, just like similar developments in the West, but at least they never went beyond five stories in height. I can't recall anything in Moscow that was quite as dark and foreboding as the brutalist monstrosities in London though.
@@Eliteerin you have your own opinion, and that alone is worth my respect. One thing I can say for sure - this tower doesn't leave you feeling indifferent.
@@noelcosgrave6515 You see, there are multitudes of Stalin-era apartment houses, they were quite diverse, sometimes looked positively Renaissance Italian in some cities (take, for instance, Volgograd or Rostov). There are more than a hundred modifications of Khrystchevkas. And yeah, they were built 9 stories high in some places. But they were modified designs, they looked quite different on the outside, but inside the layout was exactly the same. There even was an ornate luxurious design of a Khrustchevka, some of them were built in Moscow. But, apart from the projects built in their tens of thousands there are some with noting. If you're interested, look at the Izmaylovo apartment complex in Moscow - this one is unique, yet it isn't brutalist per se. It is an example of what you can achieve with prefab panels and the vision of the future. It is rather splenind looking, to my mind.
@@AW-tf9ns Most certainly. But they have to be read in order, or they make no sense whatsoever. Ignore the cover blurb, too. Harry Potter they are not. Terrible things happen to likeable people, and there's a ton of paperwork for the hero to do afterwards. I also recommend Christopher Fowler's 'Bryant and May' books - two old detectives (who work for the small 'Peculiar Crimes Unit') are tasked with clearing up 'unsolveable' cold cases, and anything weird that the normal police can't be bothered with. In a similar quirky vein, are Andrew Cartmel's 'Vinyl Detective' novels. On the surface, the un-named narrator looks for exceedingly rare records for clients. Quite often, though, this seemingly pleasant, and innocuous job leads him into some very dark places, where death and destruction often occur.
@@AW-tf9ns Absolutely. A mixture of London history and contemporary magic mixed with a police procedural. The rivers have people who represent them; the river is polluted, they get sick. The main character realizes he can perform magic but has to make sure he turns his cell phone off to prevent it frying, etc. The audio book versions are especially well read.
You’ve definitely hit the nail on the head about under investment in social housing. I live in social housing, flats to be precise, and we’ve warped walls, black mould, and our communal ceiling collapsed 11 months back. Trying to get them to fix anything is nigh on impossible.
Cough, cough... Luxury/mansion tax... cough, cough, Airbnb tax... Cough, cough... All possible solutions to chronic underinvestment in public housing...
I remember a flat in Trellick Tower featuring on 'Changing Rooms' or some other such programme made in the name of "home improvement". I recall Lawrence Llewelyn-Bowen or one of his cohorts covering a wall in the living room entirely in copper sheets. They were careful to point out the care they took around the light switch, ensuring the copper didn't come into contact with any of the electrical wiring for fear of making the entire wall...well...live!
No doubt they included that in the edit in the hope that some enthusiastic amateur decorator wouldn't copy them and electrocute themselves or their kids or their dog.
Ernő Goldfinger RA (11 September 1902 - 15 November 1987) was a Hungarian-born British architect and designer of furniture. He moved to the United Kingdom in the 1930s, and became a key member of the Modernist architectural movement. He is most prominently remembered for designing residential tower blocks, some of which are now listed buildings.
The one thing ive always loved about London is the fact that you do have cheap and expensive areas existing together cheek by jowl. Gentrification may eventually win, but in the meantime what it means is that you get less of the so called 'Ghettos' that become unloved no go areas. The area around Trellick Tower on a Friday and Saturday become the bottom end of Portobello Road Market. Most Tourists do not make it down this far but it is a good reflection of the area with middle eastern stands rubbing alongside your fruit and veg and your pile em high so called antiques!
Interesting about the Trellick tower is also the boiler room. It’s interesting because it’s not in the basement - it’s that thing that protrudes from the tower. It even has windows. The boilers were never used because of the oil crisis I think. Latest plans were to turn this room into a penthouse.
An enormous problem for social housing, especially local authority housing, is that there is a small proportion ( a smaller proportion than certain newspapers would have you believe) that might be classed 'problem tenants', and since this isn't a brutal totalitarian state (sound of worm-can softly opening) they have to be put somewhere, and no, not a concentration camp. And the moment a critical mass of these arrives in an estate, or even more so in a tower block, it's a death knell for improving community. For both of these blocks, on different sides of London, the problems really accelerated when somebody without imagination thought of them as sinks. Glenkerry is a poster for what might have been. Sixty years ago vandals would not have got away with stuff, because several burly men, and of course burly women, would have appeared and given them what might have been referred to as a clip round the ear. The price for community, as any resident of a village will tell you, is reduced privacy. It's a price well worth paying.
Controversial or not, I agree. Even back in school it was clear to me that it was a tiny proportion of the students that created all the troubles that affected everyone else.
"'problem tenants', and since this isn't a brutal totalitarian state (sound of worm-can softly opening) they have to be put somewhere, and no, not a concentration camp." Well if you chuck them out they either go somewhere else or they live on the street and then you have degenerate thieving beggars and homeless people living on the street and ruining the street instead of a tower block. Is that better or worse? Hard to say. There has to be some solution to these people.
_"The price for community, as any resident of a village will tell you, is reduced privacy. It's a price well worth paying."_ I do not quite get your point.
@Fire C I agree. One idiot tenant can ruin an area and I speak from experience. It need not even be deliberate malice or anything like that, just a disregard for others is enough. I have one neighbour who thought that just throwing his crap out the window was an easier option than putting it in the bin and it took him a couple of weeks to make the whole area look like a war zone that attracted trouble. No amount of polite requests achieved anything but luckily I'm big, scary looking and could swear for England and an (empty) threat to administer physical admonishment seems to have done the trick. He even picks up other people's crap around the flats now bless his little cotton socks. He doesn't know me well enough to know I only lamp people about once a decade, and even then it's only under the most severe provocation, so there's no real need to be scared of me... But I'm happy not to disabuse him :-D I will come to the defence of (some) drug dealers... Well... The one who lives upstairs who grows more weed than I do. Lovely guy and knows not to shit on his own doorstep.
Gotta say, it's a magnificent looking building. You can see how it works from the outside very well, which corridors allow circulation and what the houses must look like inside. Few gallery blocks like it offer that: the apartments in the Trellic are personal, something more generic flats in this catagory are often accused of not being.
I think the story of him jumping from a roof comes from a German architect Goldstein who threw himself at a diagonal pane of glass in a viewing deck to prove it wouldn't break. It didn't, unfortunately the fixings did.
Jago, Thank you for covering this . Just along the road from Trellick is the Edward Woods estate which when it was opened was a joy to visit . Largely occupied by happy residents in a well maintained estate overseen by a team of helpull caretakers. more recently a disgacefully rundown example of urban stress. the handy work of Hammersmith and Fulham council. Smack dead centre between the two is what is left of the Grenfell Tower community. Where the council got so fed up with the residents complaining about bad repairs and awful management , They employed a seperate mangement company to fob off the complaints. There is nothing wrong with the buildings in fact they range from being sound to 'bloody well done' but then then the powers that be have demonstrated that the ordinary and often poor people dont really qualify for decent treatment. We have come to realise it when Grenfell went up in flames . and so very little has improved since . I have always loved London and particularly North Kensington It makes me weep , literally in the case of Grenfell, to see the destruction an degradation. No end in sight yet I fear.
3:25 is so very beautiful! I live in a house that's slightly more than a hundred years old, and I like the feel very much. I never thought I'd even consider ever again moving into a block of flats, but I do think that Goldfinger had a point or two, followed through, and with the proper maintenance his buildings could be very good living environments. The are also much, much prettier than what was built here in Berlin at the time, esp. in the east.
I think the idea was that these blocks would be set in parkland using all the space that they had saved. To extol the virtues of open space for families and children to justify your concrete edifice and then to fail to deliver the landscape setting is probably not Goldfinger's fault but it means that the tower was not what it was promised to be in terms of a place to live.
Didn't Robin Hood Gardens have their own gardens but because of how the estate was built, it mucked up the integration with the local area? I do like and ultimately agree your idea - open space should be accessible for all. At the same time one has to consider the current community and feel of the area - would demolishing 100 buildings for 1 building be beneficial and work in the skyline, or would it feel like a prison or ivory tower?
@@mattbaker3569 I have lived in London terraced housing and it works so well in terms of identity, privacy, neighbourliness (is that a word?) and community. I do feel that the old streets should be retained at all costs and that these towers were a dreadful mistake.
@LueLou In the late 1960s I lived next door to where they were building the Nightingale (tower block) estate in Hackney. I remember saying to my friends then that they're pulling down the old slums to build the slums of the future.
Not all the land saving but certainly some, like the center of Robin Hood Gardens. We have a choice, go up or go out and further reduce whats left of the greenbelt.
I live in Ladbroke Grove and the view from my window is dominated by the Trellick Tower. When I first moved to the area I hated it, but over time it has grown on me. I think that it looks like a large futuristic snail. It is best seen at night when the lift tower is all lit up (rare) or when floodlit in green around the anniversary of Grenfell 💚
My favourite Tales From The Tube channel now covering my other geeky interest, Brutalist architecture. These 2 towers have long fascinated me, especially their journey from drug den to £500k property. Worth mentioning the lifts only stop at every other floor due to the design of the bridges to the main tower from the lift tower.
There’s some other blocks like that in the UK, with lifts stopping on every two or three floors. It certainly wouldn’t fly today, to essentially arbitrarily make only a fraction of the residences wheelchair-accessible.
Apartment blocs are indeed pretty okay if there are people who to take care of them. In fact, having somebody to take your packages when you're out and to coordinate the denizens feels pretty luxurious, even.
I always said the best thing to do with most Local Authority tower blocks was to add Concierges, and sell off or rent at a higher price (Barbican) , using the funds to fund lower rise family houses with Gardens (or flats - Golden Lane). The co-operative model can work, but if high maintenance costs are embedded in the style as it is , its not worth doing despite the social co-hesion objectives.
These have certainly shown that there are plenty of sides to every story. It's good to know that someone somewhere thinks of these as home and a good home at that. Thanks Jago, good job mate.
I was lucky enough to live in a block of flats in Hammersmith in the 70’s as a kid and the community was very strong, everybody knew each other and kept the area looking good. It was a very safe place for all residents. Council workers and caretakers were very communicative, friendly and proud of their work. Oh how things have changed!
I enjoy your presentation of the circumstances and personalities that brought these buildings about, and how they fared afterwards. Perhaps the best way to understand this type of high rise construction. All glass is the current rage in tall buildings at the moment with the result that it is often difficult to discern individual floors or units from the facade. With these particular blocks, you can get some sense of both. Maintenance is an enormous factor in how these are viewed and how they are seen and remembered. I lived in a Tokyo high rise once. It was more of a point block than a slab block, which made a positive difference in the skyline. It was quite serene to look out over a vast city and think that you were apart of it, and yet above the fray, literally. I have met my share of international architects with all the charm of a cheese grater. Not all of them are that way thankfully. The problem tenants of the architecture world.
I lived across the road from Trellick from 2004 to 2019. A great commentary Sir! Lucid, well thought out and you speak precisely of the past present & future. I'll be recommending all my North Ken people to like and share. Thank you for making such a well done piece
Named after the village of Trellick in South Wales? The places could hardly be more different. There are village signs on the three roads into Trellick (the village) and the name is spelt differently on each one. It (the village) was also the parish in which Bertrand Russell was born.
Madness filmed some of the Los Palmas 7 video on Golborne Rd. You can see the tower in the background which is how I figured out where they were. The cafe is long gone. Madness are still around.
I wouldn't want to live in one of these blocks, but these are well designed examples of brutalist tower blocks. It's credit to Goldfinger that Balfron and Trellick have been "yuppified" rather than demolished or left as sink estates for "forgotten" families.
We lived in Westbourne Park a few years ago, and each time I we went out the front door we saw Trellick. At first I hated it, thought it was hideous, but, over time, once I'd actually looked at it properly, I came to appreciate it. I was still stunned when someone told me it was listed! I actually like the new windows too. I think they suit the architecture.
I’ve lived in London - during 1980’s + 1990’s (in the ‘80’s specifically working on various renovations of council estates -ie. Hemel Hempstead, Finchley Road, Islington, Walthamstow, etc.) I have no idea how they turned out since last seeing them decades ago ...but the point is, many were retrofitted-reconfigured to meet new energy codes, safety regulations, improve security, and brighten / enliven the public areas & adjoining green spaces. I like what you said about maintenance / upkeep. Nothing, whether a building, furniture, or car etc., goes very far without being cared for. Without due care, “... there’s no there, there.” Now I live in Vancouver 🇨🇦 .. the attitude of what a “tower block” means are complete utter polar opposites. In North America ... high rise lifestyle /living very sought after ... the higher the level the more privacy/pricey & more dramatic the views. The problem back in UK is with the stigma with high rise development ||>> socioeconomic demographic dynamics vs hyper simplistic blaming the ills upon architecture alone.
I’ve been passing Trellick Tower on my trips to London, via Paddington, over the last few years. Always wondered what the story was, so I knew I had to dive into the Jago Hazzard archive to see if there was a video. Great stuff
Thanks again Jago mate. I’ve still got people in working on my kitchen, so this clip has helped. As for you being a philistinism, I doubt anyone would call you that, but that’s only because you’ve got more sense and culture in your pink finger than the average person has in their whole body.
I honestly agree with 99% of your architectural criticism. In fact, the reason I subscribed was that you once described a tube station as being built in the style of "yeah, ok, whatever...". Please keep up the excellent work!
At last! I have been waiting eagerly for this and you certainly didn't disappoint! They are certainly very interesting buildings. It makes me sad that they'll be getting hit by gentrification, but that's just one of those things, I suppose. I think it's nice that the previous residents weren't all just thrown in the bin, and that there were some new housing developments made with them in mind. Your home is your home, though. You can't really replace that, sometimes.
Now then, the first council flat I lived in was a squat on Wandsworth road, there was a large and supportive squatting community who helped with everything. Luckily the council hadn't smashed and filled in the toilet. Since then I've lived on many many estates all over Sheffield, mostly really good communities, even now. Most of the flats I've lived in have been demolished (nowt to do with me!) and not replaced.. to keep people desperate to buy houses, vote tory and be afraid of Society and Socialism.. reap what you sow. Really enjoy your hopefulness and informativeness, thank you
Seeing Trellick Tower is a highlight of any train journey into or out of Paddington. It is fascinating to look at, and it's good to hear that it works well as a place to live in.
Ninety thousand subs. Good going, and well done, sir. Completely deserved, if I might say so. Nice one. Seeing that six months ago, you were celebrating 1000 subscribers it's quite phenomenal. Thank you for your videos. Each one, a quality item.
I'm so glad the weather cleared up so you could film this, it looks crisp and lovely. Following from p1, when I attempted to visit Trellick for photos in 2011 (being from US) it felt like a rough area. There was a vagrant shouting at everyone on the street, not-so-friendly people hanging about staring at me; and when I rounded the corner and saw all the graffiti after all that, I was like...nope. But whenever I'm in London I always look for it and would love to go inside. It does look superbly well built and in great condition.
Living on the corner of top floor of my block, at the Northern end of The White City Estate, i could see both the Trellick AND Post Office Tower's. They were a joy to behold; were futuristic looking and inspirational to me, back then, in the 70's & 80's
Possibly the best expression of brutalist architecture in tower block form. Elegent in it's own brutal way. And a well-balanced conclusion on a most contentious of subjects, Jago. On the whole, I'd reach the same conclusions.
Enjoyed this very much as a former housing officer who worked in that area in the 70s. Just to point out that local authorities were heavily financially incentivised by government subsidy to build high initially, so their motives weren’t entirely unreasonably idealistic.
I really enjoy these videos on the buildings of London. I'd love to see your take on the oxo building. The Tate and Battersea Power Station would be amazing too, but possibly too much to fit in to your usual video length? The OXO is cool and interesting but possibly a little more likely to fit in to 10-15mins. 🤔😁
I’m not a fan of brutalist towers - but there’s still something about these that is admirable. I think that the giant towers were doomed to fail as family communities, the scale and form just make them impersonal and alienating - doesn’t mean that they can’t function as gated enclaves for the more wealthy. But as you show, the smaller blocks can work and could work better.
Aye. If they were more appealing to look at it'd be a little different, such as white walls with multicoloured windows. (though if done badly it'd look like a multi-story balamory) The triple deal killer for me is that I don't like being at heights, there's no garden, and because a flat is part of a larger structure the resident doesn't own & built upon ground they don't own either, they can never realistically have the residential security of ownership typical of a suburban semi/fully detatched house. Or in short: I like to keep my feet on the ground; and own [some of] the ground itself.
So glad to see the second part. Always a delight to watch and listen to your retelling of interesting histories of London. Long may you continue to entertain and educate. - How about when you run out of interesting stories on the Tube and buildings, do a video where the viewers have to guess what you are showing? - A name that building/train station etc... I imagine you have alot of footage that could support this ( but a huge editing project,I imagine).
2:37 The collapse of Ronan Point was due to the floor structure of each storey being supported on the one below, like a stack of bricks, rather than each floor being supported with it's own dedicated connection to a larger structural frame. Following this, alterations were made to building standards which stand to this day, as all Architects and Engineers are taught when they study their respective disciplines.
@5:43 I'm here for that quote and I think you're being pretty reasonable about the whole situation. Some of our tower block situations felt a bit sabotagey but some of them were just plain sabotage. The trip is, whatever first hand experiences we have, we don't tell people because it sounds too farfetched or incredible even in our own ears😓. *Butt* such is the nature of the beast so... eeehhhh I dunno🤷🏾♀️😅
I lived in Wornington Green Estate, which was a short walk from Trellick Tower. It’s been a tower I’ve seen all my life. But there is one thing I’ve always wondered was that top glass bit.....what did it hold? then was told by my dad that is held the boiler. I remember during the 2012 Olympic they decided to put coloured lights in there to make it look pretty. Would you be able to find any information on Wornington Green Estate, which is slowly disappearing due to regeneration. I’d love to know more about where I use to live. Thank you so much.
@@highpath4776 Oh no not in NW but it’s in W10 just surrounding Golborne and Ladbroke grove, There’s still some of the building remaining, but they are slowly disappearing. I lived there all my life but didn’t know much about it & I fail to see why they got rid of the old buildings, the new ones are terrible. I also think the same person that built Wornington Green estate are the same people that built Motzart estate, as they look so similar, but I’m not quite sure.
Jago you’ve nailed it with your comments about investment. Poorly maintained properties even if well built, create a negative cycle of decline. I’ve never understood why social housing has been a byword for badly built accommodation occupied by problem families. Why does it have to be like this? The co operative shows that it is possible to re invent the same concept in a positive way by instilling a sense of pride and ‘ownership’ in the tenants. Selling the blocks to developers (who no doubt reinvigorate some tired housing) is really the easy option but it shunts the problems into someone else’s back yard. Would I like a Goldfinger block in my neighbourhood? Of course not. Are they an iconic part of London’s incredible urban fabric? Definitely!!
Well another well documented film ! It needs to be said high rise flats where developed to house people in a economic way , good or bad architects did there job not always how they wanted , usually budgets , gold finger was a great architect as said , having worked in his buildings little things like door handles that could be opened easily for older people you didn't have to twist any thing and taps that could be operated with your arms doors opened without conflict into other areas , Thankyou for your film ! and to bring such subjects to people attention !!
Thank you very much for making this. As I wrote before I lived in the shadow of this tower for a while and the weird architecture was always fascinating. :)
Aragon Tower in the Pepys Estate, Deptford has a similar separate adjoining lift tower like Balfron and Trellick. And also a similar troubled history and now gentrified regeneration which is still on-going. I had a great friend - recently passed - who lived on the top floor. The views facing the Thames taking in the Greenwich peninsula, docklands and Canary Wharf are spectacular. Like most tower blocks, it's better to look out of, than look at. Might be worth doing a video on this...
Quiet enjoyed this and the vid on Broadgate/Broad St, Millennium Bridge “lift” (it didnt stay open for long after its initial opening!) Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury & Queen Victoria St. Something on the nearby infamous Fleet St & its stunning Art Deco buildings including the former Daily Express building. Humble Requests if you would consider them: 1. Art Deco London by Jago 2.Playlist with all your vids in the order sequence you feel best presents the content so I can watch on my apple TV like a superior version of a documentary. Keep up the great work and ignore the detractors, youtube offers both viewers and content producers to find what they enjoy, and there will always be a large audience drawn to your vids. Totally brilliant.
Trellick Tower has been one of my favourite buildings in London for years now, and particularly now the place is so well looked after I'd love to live in it one day.
Very interesting series about tower blocks. Any chance of a look at the stonebridge park estate tower blocks? ( now demolished). As teenagers, a few of us managed to get onto the roof of one. We, as a family did get offered a flat, but my mother just wasn't keen.
A Rivers of London shout-out! Awesome! That's my favourite book series, very well researched it seems, and it's always great to hear more about how it ties back to the real London.
I think there is a beautiful lyricism to Goldfinger's high rise housing projects. But that's me, I prefer composition over artifice. And I love concrete. And beautiful presentation, thank you for creating awareness.
I'd like to know more about this resident cooperative you mentioned at the end. How did it come into being? How does it work? How does it hold up against other forms of rent/ownership in its immediate surroundings?
I really enjoy your witty humour especially when it comes to building designs around London please make more keep up the good work 👍 please make more videos 🤫
These are fascinating videos. I love learning the history of these buildings and the areas around them. Some of my fathers family lived in Popler many years ago and before these horrors were built. (Think ‘Call the Midwife’ era) I’ve subscribed. Thank you.
@@highpath4776 Yes, they could be. But I’m sure I’ve heard them mention Popler. Whatever, they were very deprived areas indeed. And my father used to often mention Limehouse.
I love the occasional brutalist building. Not all Tower blocks are a failure. Really intrigued by the 'lookout tower. Can't bear building to not offend. '
How many parts are there. Just the two. Still I do like the history of what you explain about buildings, architects and transportation in London. Fascinating.
I worked in Kensal Road and walked past this through the Cheltenham Estate on the way to work everyday. These days I'm more likely to walk through Cheltenham...
He’s the man: the man with the concrete touch...
😂😂😂😂
But you must not touch!
A spider's touch
The concierge had a deadly bowler hat .
🙄🙄🙄
We need an equivalent of “turn in one’s grave” for those who are cremated. I suggest “churn in one’s urn.” It rhymes! 😜
Your analysis is spot on. The tower blocks are vertical neighbourhoods. A private corridor on the 18th floor is the same as a public street on the surface. Both need to be cared for constantly, whether it’s a hole in the carpet or in the asphalt.
It’s a shame that councils built these lofty towers with lofty standards but never did basic maintenance.
It’s a sin because it reinforces the stereotypes about the working classes, that they can’t take care of things, that’s it’s all they deserve.
A tower block is like a model with a muscle body: they’re high maintenance.
The difference between a proletarian project and a bourgeois condominium isn’t architectural, it’s TLC.
One can easily turn into the other and back again.
I like "swearing in the wind", but it's too close to "swearing into the wind"
Ahh well...
Churn in his/her urn... yep I will defo use that :D
the lack of maintenance has more to do with reduced funding due to political changes than lack of ambition
Thank you for sharing. 🖖
Churn in the urn? Some ashes are scattered. What do we call them? I guess the answer is blowin' in the wind...
I don't know why these videos about random London architecture are so entertaining.
Same
Because it's interesting to learn about the history of biggest city in Europe and also Mr Hazzard's narrative is very entertaining
"No Mister Tenant, I expect you to buy!"
"Glory to you~ and your Hou~se." - Gowron Real Estate.
Trellik Tower used to have the loveliest coloured glass panels covering the back wall of the entrance. They were removed at some point and I felt that really took away from the soul of this great beast of a building.
We were one of the first families to move into Trellick back in '72. I was very young & was shielded from a lot of the social problems that I only really became aware of after we left.
I do remember the surrounding area being extremely grim at the time & of being nervous when playing in the playgrounds beneath - since dismantled along with the garages & other walkways - due to objects raining down from above at times plus the long walks up the stairs when the lifts broke down.
Great views though! I still pass by occasionally & always look up at our old flat.
throwing things is their way of bombing people.
Its funny how people who have never been into a block are always shocked at the space and the views!
Trellick sounds like a Cornish name.I went in the Trellick Tower about 2000 to the top floor to enjoy the views across London. Imagine living high up during the great storm of 1987.
Those buildings look less like a jail but still looks harsh. It sort of makes me think of a futuristic soviet thing. I really like the fact that he lived in one of the buildings for a while after if was finished.
Yeah Brutalism wasn't designed to look friendly and warm. I like the idea behind it a whole lot more than the façade. Him living there if only for two months was indeed praiseworthy, even if he was apparently an unfriendly man in general, according to part 1.
Best viewed from the top deck of a Bristol Megabus arriving along the M4 into London
@@bryansmith1920 That is not what a humanist is...
In the tower blocks I lived in as a kid people said the architect should be forced to live here. They also wanted a concierge but never got one.
Not surprising considering it was the communist ideology that ultimately (trough a few evolution's) lead down this path of architecture that we are still struggling with today.
“Do you expect me to talk?” “No Mr Bond, I expect you to live within your means!”
What is the overhanging part of the stairwell section for? Was it meant to be a viewing tower or anything?
That's the plant room for the boiler and other equipment.
@@AthenaNova1 Why would you put the heavy, large and difficult to replace boiler at such a height?
@@otm646 I'm guessing it's to save space. If you put the boiler in the basement, then a chimney has to cut through every single floor on the way up..
The reason why it is all do high up is because the idea was to save money, water and the like would be able to move down to the flats through gravity. This means that you would have to pump it less.
I think it would make a great viewing area.
Getting addicted to these vids and watching all the previous ones back to back. Just brilliant and so informative. Our head office is in London and I can’t wait to explore these places when we’re allowed back. Keep it up 👍🏻
Having lived in Russian cities usually comprised solely of tower blocks of various sizes (good luck to you if you can do something with a shape of a shoe box), I find these towers' architecture sinister and forbidding. They look aggressive and almost dystopian to me. As if it was a set piece from Clockwork Orange or something similarly Ridley Scott inspired. Russian tower blocks may be more basic and less architecturally imposing, but they don't give you this shiver down the spine, they are more friendly and less brutal, if you excuse the expression...
And, dear Jago, please keep making these. You videos make my teatime even mare enjoyable. Thanks a ton for your work!
Strangely I prefer brutalism architecture to commie blocks but that's probably because I'm odd
The Stalinka apartments were architecturally speaking easy on the eye. On the other hand the Khrushchyovka used an ugly prefabricated concrete panel construction, just like similar developments in the West, but at least they never went beyond five stories in height. I can't recall anything in Moscow that was quite as dark and foreboding as the brutalist monstrosities in London though.
@@Eliteerin you have your own opinion, and that alone is worth my respect. One thing I can say for sure - this tower doesn't leave you feeling indifferent.
@@noelcosgrave6515 You see, there are multitudes of Stalin-era apartment houses, they were quite diverse, sometimes looked positively Renaissance Italian in some cities (take, for instance, Volgograd or Rostov). There are more than a hundred modifications of Khrystchevkas. And yeah, they were built 9 stories high in some places. But they were modified designs, they looked quite different on the outside, but inside the layout was exactly the same. There even was an ornate luxurious design of a Khrustchevka, some of them were built in Moscow. But, apart from the projects built in their tens of thousands there are some with noting. If you're interested, look at the Izmaylovo apartment complex in Moscow - this one is unique, yet it isn't brutalist per se. It is an example of what you can achieve with prefab panels and the vision of the future. It is rather splenind looking, to my mind.
@@noelcosgrave6515
The prefabbed panels and the steel framed glass curtain wall came from not the USSR and New York, but Liverpool.
Excellent - I literally just finished Part 1, and clicked the Bell to notify me of Part 2 - and it appears within minutes. Great Stuff Hazzard!
Do subscribe,its great stuff
Great videos on the tube as well
His videos are brilliant.
Nice callout to the Rivers of London books.
Such a brilliant series! Loved Broken Homes.
Worth a read?
@@AW-tf9ns Most certainly. But they have to be read in order, or they make no sense whatsoever. Ignore the cover blurb, too. Harry Potter they are not. Terrible things happen to likeable people, and there's a ton of paperwork for the hero to do afterwards. I also recommend Christopher Fowler's 'Bryant and May' books - two old detectives (who work for the small 'Peculiar Crimes Unit') are tasked with clearing up 'unsolveable' cold cases, and anything weird that the normal police can't be bothered with. In a similar quirky vein, are Andrew Cartmel's 'Vinyl Detective' novels. On the surface, the un-named narrator looks for exceedingly rare records for clients. Quite often, though, this seemingly pleasant, and innocuous job leads him into some very dark places, where death and destruction often occur.
@@AW-tf9ns Absolutely. A mixture of London history and contemporary magic mixed with a police procedural. The rivers have people who represent them; the river is polluted, they get sick. The main character realizes he can perform magic but has to make sure he turns his cell phone off to prevent it frying, etc.
The audio book versions are especially well read.
@@soviut303 thanks chaps, been looking for a new book!
Another interesting fact is that Trellick Tower was a transmitter site for the pirate radio station Thameside Radio in the 1980s
People just do nothing lol
I wouldn't be surprised if these towers get used for a lot of them.
You’ve definitely hit the nail on the head about under investment in social housing.
I live in social housing, flats to be precise, and we’ve warped walls, black mould, and our communal ceiling collapsed 11 months back.
Trying to get them to fix anything is nigh on impossible.
Spray the mould with diluted bleach to kill it.
Cough, cough... Luxury/mansion tax... cough, cough, Airbnb tax... Cough, cough... All possible solutions to chronic underinvestment in public housing...
I remember a flat in Trellick Tower featuring on 'Changing Rooms' or some other such programme made in the name of "home improvement". I recall Lawrence Llewelyn-Bowen or one of his cohorts covering a wall in the living room entirely in copper sheets. They were careful to point out the care they took around the light switch, ensuring the copper didn't come into contact with any of the electrical wiring for fear of making the entire wall...well...live!
No doubt they included that in the edit in the hope that some enthusiastic amateur decorator wouldn't copy them and electrocute themselves or their kids or their dog.
Obviously a lot more confident about damp in a 1970s tower block than i would have been.
Ernő Goldfinger RA (11 September 1902 - 15 November 1987) was a Hungarian-born British architect and designer of furniture. He moved to the United Kingdom in the 1930s, and became a key member of the Modernist architectural movement. He is most prominently remembered for designing residential tower blocks, some of which are now listed buildings.
The one thing ive always loved about London is the fact that you do have cheap and expensive areas existing together cheek by jowl. Gentrification may eventually win, but in the meantime what it means is that you get less of the so called 'Ghettos' that become unloved no go areas.
The area around Trellick Tower on a Friday and Saturday become the bottom end of Portobello Road Market. Most Tourists do not make it down this far but it is a good reflection of the area with middle eastern stands rubbing alongside your fruit and veg and your pile em high so called antiques!
Interesting about the Trellick tower is also the boiler room. It’s interesting because it’s not in the basement - it’s that thing that protrudes from the tower. It even has windows. The boilers were never used because of the oil crisis I think. Latest plans were to turn this room into a penthouse.
I'd always wondered what that thing was!
I’d like to design a retrofit & design it as a communal view lounge for the residents - perhaps a drinks bar?
@@smallstudiodesign If into a drinks bar; then a funny name is obligatory ;-) .
An enormous problem for social housing, especially local authority housing, is that there is a small proportion ( a smaller proportion than certain newspapers would have you believe) that might be classed 'problem tenants', and since this isn't a brutal totalitarian state (sound of worm-can softly opening) they have to be put somewhere, and no, not a concentration camp. And the moment a critical mass of these arrives in an estate, or even more so in a tower block, it's a death knell for improving community. For both of these blocks, on different sides of London, the problems really accelerated when somebody without imagination thought of them as sinks. Glenkerry is a poster for what might have been. Sixty years ago vandals would not have got away with stuff, because several burly men, and of course burly women, would have appeared and given them what might have been referred to as a clip round the ear. The price for community, as any resident of a village will tell you, is reduced privacy. It's a price well worth paying.
Controversial or not, I agree. Even back in school it was clear to me that it was a tiny proportion of the students that created all the troubles that affected everyone else.
"'problem tenants', and since this isn't a brutal totalitarian state (sound of worm-can softly opening) they have to be put somewhere, and no, not a concentration camp." Well if you chuck them out they either go somewhere else or they live on the street and then you have degenerate thieving beggars and homeless people living on the street and ruining the street instead of a tower block. Is that better or worse? Hard to say. There has to be some solution to these people.
_"The price for community, as any resident of a village will tell you, is reduced privacy. It's a price well worth paying."_
I do not quite get your point.
Nicely put. Enjoy that warm can!
@Fire C I agree. One idiot tenant can ruin an area and I speak from experience. It need not even be deliberate malice or anything like that, just a disregard for others is enough.
I have one neighbour who thought that just throwing his crap out the window was an easier option than putting it in the bin and it took him a couple of weeks to make the whole area look like a war zone that attracted trouble. No amount of polite requests achieved anything but luckily I'm big, scary looking and could swear for England and an (empty) threat to administer physical admonishment seems to have done the trick. He even picks up other people's crap around the flats now bless his little cotton socks. He doesn't know me well enough to know I only lamp people about once a decade, and even then it's only under the most severe provocation, so there's no real need to be scared of me... But I'm happy not to disabuse him :-D
I will come to the defence of (some) drug dealers... Well... The one who lives upstairs who grows more weed than I do. Lovely guy and knows not to shit on his own doorstep.
Gotta say, it's a magnificent looking building. You can see how it works from the outside very well, which corridors allow circulation and what the houses must look like inside. Few gallery blocks like it offer that: the apartments in the Trellic are personal, something more generic flats in this catagory are often accused of not being.
I think the story of him jumping from a roof comes from a German architect Goldstein who threw himself at a diagonal pane of glass in a viewing deck to prove it wouldn't break. It didn't, unfortunately the fixings did.
I think a guy in Canada did something similar. The glass was lovely. The frame... Not so much.
Maybe you're thinking id Gary Hoy the Toronto lawyer.
Jago,
Thank you for covering this .
Just along the road from Trellick is the Edward Woods estate which when it was opened was a joy to visit . Largely occupied by happy residents in a well maintained estate overseen by a team of helpull caretakers. more recently a disgacefully rundown example of urban stress. the handy work of Hammersmith and Fulham council.
Smack dead centre between the two is what is left of the Grenfell Tower community.
Where the council got so fed up with the residents complaining about bad repairs and awful management , They employed a seperate mangement company to fob off the complaints.
There is nothing wrong with the buildings in fact they range from being sound to 'bloody well done'
but then then the powers that be have demonstrated that the ordinary and often poor people dont really qualify for decent treatment. We have come to realise it when Grenfell went up in flames . and so very little has improved since .
I have always loved London and particularly North Kensington It makes me weep , literally in the case of Grenfell, to see the destruction an degradation.
No end in sight yet I fear.
Loving the run of Brutalist-focused videos, keep up the great work!
Barbican Towers & complex please!
@@jschreiber6461 He's done Barbican already! :)
@@phosgene87 Was Barbican not just done as part of the high-walk video? Or was there a specific video?
3:25 is so very beautiful!
I live in a house that's slightly more than a hundred years old, and I like the feel very much. I never thought I'd even consider ever again moving into a block of flats, but I do think that Goldfinger had a point or two, followed through, and with the proper maintenance his buildings could be very good living environments. The are also much, much prettier than what was built here in Berlin at the time, esp. in the east.
I think the idea was that these blocks would be set in parkland using all the space that they had saved. To extol the virtues of open space for families and children to justify your concrete edifice and then to fail to deliver the landscape setting is probably not Goldfinger's fault but it means that the tower was not what it was promised to be in terms of a place to live.
Didn't Robin Hood Gardens have their own gardens but because of how the estate was built, it mucked up the integration with the local area?
I do like and ultimately agree your idea - open space should be accessible for all. At the same time one has to consider the current community and feel of the area - would demolishing 100 buildings for 1 building be beneficial and work in the skyline, or would it feel like a prison or ivory tower?
@@mattbaker3569 I have lived in London terraced housing and it works so well in terms of identity, privacy, neighbourliness (is that a word?) and community. I do feel that the old streets should be retained at all costs and that these towers were a dreadful mistake.
@LueLou Point taken, thanks LueLou.
@LueLou In the late 1960s I lived next door to where they were building the Nightingale (tower block) estate in Hackney. I remember saying to my friends then that they're pulling down the old slums to build the slums of the future.
Not all the land saving but certainly some, like the center of Robin Hood Gardens. We have a choice, go up or go out and further reduce whats left of the greenbelt.
I live in Ladbroke Grove and the view from my window is dominated by the Trellick Tower. When I first moved to the area I hated it, but over time it has grown on me. I think that it looks like a large futuristic snail. It is best seen at night when the lift tower is all lit up (rare) or when floodlit in green around the anniversary of Grenfell 💚
Me too, I enjoy looking at it, lit up at night, from my window.
My favourite Tales From The Tube channel now covering my other geeky interest, Brutalist architecture. These 2 towers have long fascinated me, especially their journey from drug den to £500k property. Worth mentioning the lifts only stop at every other floor due to the design of the bridges to the main tower from the lift tower.
There’s some other blocks like that in the UK, with lifts stopping on every two or three floors. It certainly wouldn’t fly today, to essentially arbitrarily make only a fraction of the residences wheelchair-accessible.
@@kaitlyn__L There's a University of Birmingham Building where there are two sets of lifts - I think one is for odd floors and the other for even!
Apartment blocs are indeed pretty okay if there are people who to take care of them. In fact, having somebody to take your packages when you're out and to coordinate the denizens feels pretty luxurious, even.
I always said the best thing to do with most Local Authority tower blocks was to add Concierges, and sell off or rent at a higher price (Barbican) , using the funds to fund lower rise family houses with Gardens (or flats - Golden Lane). The co-operative model can work, but if high maintenance costs are embedded in the style as it is , its not worth doing despite the social co-hesion objectives.
These have certainly shown that there are plenty of sides to every story. It's good to know that someone somewhere thinks of these as home and a good home at that. Thanks Jago, good job mate.
I was lucky enough to live in a block of flats in Hammersmith in the 70’s as a kid and the community was very strong, everybody knew each other and kept the area looking good. It was a very safe place for all residents. Council workers and caretakers were very communicative, friendly and proud of their work. Oh how things have changed!
I enjoy your presentation of the circumstances and personalities that brought these buildings about, and how they fared afterwards. Perhaps the best way to understand this type of high rise construction. All glass is the current rage in tall buildings at the moment with the result that it is often difficult to discern individual floors or units from the facade. With these particular blocks, you can get some sense of both. Maintenance is an enormous factor in how these are viewed and how they are seen and remembered.
I lived in a Tokyo high rise once. It was more of a point block than a slab block, which made a positive difference in the skyline. It was quite serene to look out over a vast city and think that you were apart of it, and yet above the fray, literally. I have met my share of international architects with all the charm of a cheese grater. Not all of them are that way thankfully. The problem tenants of the architecture world.
I lived across the road from Trellick from 2004 to 2019. A great commentary Sir! Lucid, well thought out and you speak precisely of the past present & future. I'll be recommending all my North Ken people to like and share. Thank you for making such a well done piece
What's your opinion on this hideous structure?
@@Tumbledweeb Well we clearly know yours...
Named after the village of Trellick in South Wales? The places could hardly be more different. There are village signs on the three roads into Trellick (the village) and the name is spelt differently on each one. It (the village) was also the parish in which Bertrand Russell was born.
Madness filmed some of the Los Palmas 7 video on Golborne Rd. You can see the tower in the background which is how I figured out where they were. The cafe is long gone. Madness are still around.
I wouldn't want to live in one of these blocks, but these are well designed examples of brutalist tower blocks. It's credit to Goldfinger that Balfron and Trellick have been "yuppified" rather than demolished or left as sink estates for "forgotten" families.
We lived in Westbourne Park a few years ago, and each time I we went out the front door we saw Trellick. At first I hated it, thought it was hideous, but, over time, once I'd actually looked at it properly, I came to appreciate it. I was still stunned when someone told me it was listed!
I actually like the new windows too. I think they suit the architecture.
I’ve lived in London - during 1980’s + 1990’s (in the ‘80’s specifically working on various renovations of council estates -ie. Hemel Hempstead, Finchley Road, Islington, Walthamstow, etc.) I have no idea how they turned out since last seeing them decades ago ...but the point is, many were retrofitted-reconfigured to meet new energy codes, safety regulations, improve security, and brighten / enliven the public areas & adjoining green spaces.
I like what you said about maintenance / upkeep. Nothing, whether a building, furniture, or car etc., goes very far without being cared for.
Without due care, “... there’s no there, there.” Now I live in Vancouver 🇨🇦 .. the attitude of what a “tower block” means are complete utter polar opposites. In North America ... high rise lifestyle /living very sought after ... the higher the level the more privacy/pricey & more dramatic the views. The problem back in UK is with the stigma with high rise development ||>> socioeconomic demographic dynamics vs hyper simplistic blaming the ills upon architecture alone.
I’ve been passing Trellick Tower on my trips to London, via Paddington, over the last few years. Always wondered what the story was, so I knew I had to dive into the Jago Hazzard archive to see if there was a video. Great stuff
Thanks again Jago mate. I’ve still got people in working on my kitchen, so this clip has helped. As for you being a philistinism, I doubt anyone would call you that, but that’s only because you’ve got more sense and culture in your pink finger than the average person has in their whole body.
Huge Props for the Rivers of London shoutout!!
Wonderful series of books!
I honestly agree with 99% of your architectural criticism. In fact, the reason I subscribed was that you once described a tube station as being built in the style of "yeah, ok, whatever...". Please keep up the excellent work!
At last! I have been waiting eagerly for this and you certainly didn't disappoint!
They are certainly very interesting buildings. It makes me sad that they'll be getting hit by gentrification, but that's just one of those things, I suppose. I think it's nice that the previous residents weren't all just thrown in the bin, and that there were some new housing developments made with them in mind.
Your home is your home, though. You can't really replace that, sometimes.
Now then, the first council flat I lived in was a squat on Wandsworth road, there was a large and supportive squatting community who helped with everything. Luckily the council hadn't smashed and filled in the toilet. Since then I've lived on many many estates all over Sheffield, mostly really good communities, even now. Most of the flats I've lived in have been demolished (nowt to do with me!) and not replaced.. to keep people desperate to buy houses, vote tory and be afraid of Society and Socialism.. reap what you sow. Really enjoy your hopefulness and informativeness, thank you
5 Views, 5 likes, perfectly balanced, love your work!
"No, I expect you to drop, Mr Bond."
Seeing Trellick Tower is a highlight of any train journey into or out of Paddington. It is fascinating to look at, and it's good to hear that it works well as a place to live in.
Ninety thousand subs. Good going, and well done, sir. Completely deserved, if I might say so. Nice one. Seeing that six months ago, you were celebrating 1000 subscribers it's quite phenomenal. Thank you for your videos. Each one, a quality item.
I thank you!
I'm so glad the weather cleared up so you could film this, it looks crisp and lovely. Following from p1, when I attempted to visit Trellick for photos in 2011 (being from US) it felt like a rough area. There was a vagrant shouting at everyone on the street, not-so-friendly people hanging about staring at me; and when I rounded the corner and saw all the graffiti after all that, I was like...nope. But whenever I'm in London I always look for it and would love to go inside. It does look superbly well built and in great condition.
I think they are beautiful monuments, especially the Trellick tower!
Erno Goldfinger was not happy that Ian Fleming called his villain Goldfinger. Fleming offered to change the name to Golddick. True story.
My favourite piece of brutalist architecture. Great commentary as usual from you. Your tube stories are brilliant.
Excellent presentation and stories of social history Jago.love the underground stories too,well done.
Another very interesting film, thank you. Great to see more and more 20th century architectural content on the channel.
No Large Panel Systems (LPS) in this beauty--all Cast-In-Place (CIP) concrete... should last centuries.
Living on the corner of top floor of my block, at the Northern end of The White City Estate, i could see both the Trellick AND Post Office Tower's.
They were a joy to behold; were futuristic looking and inspirational to me, back then, in the 70's & 80's
Possibly the best expression of brutalist architecture in tower block form. Elegent in it's own brutal way.
And a well-balanced conclusion on a most contentious of subjects, Jago. On the whole, I'd reach the same conclusions.
I think I just went past this on a train from Paddington to Reading. I recognised the architecture as Goldfinger almost immediately
Enjoyed this very much as a former housing officer who worked in that area in the 70s. Just to point out that local authorities were heavily financially incentivised by government subsidy to build high initially, so their motives weren’t entirely unreasonably idealistic.
I really enjoy these videos on the buildings of London.
I'd love to see your take on the oxo building. The Tate and Battersea Power Station would be amazing too, but possibly too much to fit in to your usual video length? The OXO is cool and interesting but possibly a little more likely to fit in to 10-15mins. 🤔😁
I assume you mean Tate Modern (Southwark Power Station)
@@highpath4776 yes the Tate Modern, I always call it the Tate. Just a habit.
@@highpath4776 Correctly, Bankside Power Station. Haven't been able to visit the gallery but I knew it well as a Power Station.
what is the OXO?
@@SamSitar coin street waterloo
That co-op housing sounds dope
I’m not a fan of brutalist towers - but there’s still something about these that is admirable.
I think that the giant towers were doomed to fail as family communities, the scale and form just make them impersonal and alienating - doesn’t mean that they can’t function as gated enclaves for the more wealthy. But as you show, the smaller blocks can work and could work better.
Aye. If they were more appealing to look at it'd be a little different, such as white walls with multicoloured windows.
(though if done badly it'd look like a multi-story balamory)
The triple deal killer for me is that I don't like being at heights, there's no garden, and because a flat is part of a larger structure the resident doesn't own & built upon ground they don't own either, they can never realistically have the residential security of ownership typical of a suburban semi/fully detatched house.
Or in short: I like to keep my feet on the ground; and own [some of] the ground itself.
So glad to see the second part. Always a delight to watch and listen to your retelling of interesting histories of London. Long may you continue to entertain and educate. - How about when you run out of interesting stories on the Tube and buildings, do a video where the viewers have to guess what you are showing? - A name that building/train station etc... I imagine you have alot of footage that could support this ( but a huge editing project,I imagine).
2:37 The collapse of Ronan Point was due to the floor structure of each storey being supported on the one below, like a stack of bricks, rather than each floor being supported with it's own dedicated connection to a larger structural frame. Following this, alterations were made to building standards which stand to this day, as all Architects and Engineers are taught when they study their respective disciplines.
@5:43 I'm here for that quote and I think you're being pretty reasonable about the whole situation. Some of our tower block situations felt a bit sabotagey but some of them were just plain sabotage. The trip is, whatever first hand experiences we have, we don't tell people because it sounds too farfetched or incredible even in our own ears😓. *Butt* such is the nature of the beast so... eeehhhh I dunno🤷🏾♀️😅
I lived in Wornington Green Estate, which was a short walk from Trellick Tower. It’s been a tower I’ve seen all my life. But there is one thing I’ve always wondered was that top glass bit.....what did it hold? then was told by my dad that is held the boiler. I remember during the 2012 Olympic they decided to put coloured lights in there to make it look pretty. Would you be able to find any information on Wornington Green Estate, which is slowly disappearing due to regeneration. I’d love to know more about where I use to live. Thank you so much.
Think I found what you call Wornington (NW London always feels like a place to pass quickly through to me). Indeed another interesting place.
@@highpath4776 Oh no not in NW but it’s in W10 just surrounding Golborne and Ladbroke grove, There’s still some of the building remaining, but they are slowly disappearing. I lived there all my life but didn’t know much about it & I fail to see why they got rid of the old buildings, the new ones are terrible. I also think the same person that built Wornington Green estate are the same people that built Motzart estate, as they look so similar, but I’m not quite sure.
Jago you’ve nailed it with your comments about investment. Poorly maintained properties even if well built, create a negative cycle of decline.
I’ve never understood why social housing has been a byword for badly built accommodation occupied by problem families. Why does it have to be like this?
The co operative shows that it is possible to re invent the same concept in a positive way by instilling a sense of pride and ‘ownership’ in the tenants. Selling the blocks to developers (who no doubt reinvigorate some tired housing) is really the easy option but it shunts the problems into someone else’s back yard.
Would I like a Goldfinger block in my neighbourhood? Of course not.
Are they an iconic part of London’s incredible urban fabric? Definitely!!
Fascinating stuff. I am probably also a philistine but I struggle to see how these brutalist blocks merit grade II listed status
Great observation about the funding to operate vs build. True on my side of the pond too.
Your mild-mannered and forgiving essays are iterated so well. Your fury about greed is so polite. Love your work, Jago.
Well another well documented film ! It needs to be said high rise flats where developed to house people in a economic way , good or bad architects did there job not always how they wanted , usually budgets , gold finger was a great architect as said , having worked in his buildings little things like door handles that could be opened easily for older people you didn't have to twist any thing and taps that could be operated with your arms doors opened without conflict into other areas , Thankyou for your film ! and to bring such subjects to people attention !!
Enjoyed learning about buildings I have seen many times, but knew little about
I'm so glad you covered both of them!
Could you please do a piece on the Odeon Elephant & Castle designed by Goldfinger.
I love it when Jago talks architecture.
Thank you very much for making this. As I wrote before I lived in the shadow of this tower for a while and the weird architecture was always fascinating. :)
Aaronovich is one hell of architecture geek. One of my favourite parts of his books.
I saw this building every day for years driving the west way. Always wanted to know more about it. Cheers Jago.
Aragon Tower in the Pepys Estate, Deptford has a similar separate adjoining lift tower like Balfron and Trellick. And also a similar troubled history and now gentrified regeneration which is still on-going. I had a great friend - recently passed - who lived on the top floor. The views facing the Thames taking in the Greenwich peninsula, docklands and Canary Wharf are spectacular. Like most tower blocks, it's better to look out of, than look at. Might be worth doing a video on this...
I have absolutely no problem with tower blocks as long as they are well designed, well built and well maintained!
Quiet enjoyed this and the vid on Broadgate/Broad St, Millennium Bridge “lift” (it didnt stay open for long after its initial opening!) Fitzrovia, Bloomsbury & Queen Victoria St. Something on the nearby infamous Fleet St & its stunning Art Deco buildings including the former Daily Express building.
Humble Requests if you would consider them:
1. Art Deco London by Jago
2.Playlist with all your vids in the order sequence you feel best presents the content so I can watch on my apple TV like a superior version of a documentary.
Keep up the great work and ignore the detractors, youtube offers both viewers and content producers to find what they enjoy, and there will always be a large audience drawn to your vids. Totally brilliant.
Another well researched and well balanced video. Thanks Jago
I found myself clicking "like" before I had even seen this video.
Enjoying your videos about London and its history, keep up the good work.
Trellick Tower has been one of my favourite buildings in London for years now, and particularly now the place is so well looked after I'd love to live in it one day.
Very interesting series about tower blocks. Any chance of a look at the stonebridge park estate tower blocks? ( now demolished). As teenagers, a few of us managed to get onto the roof of one. We, as a family did get offered a flat, but my mother just wasn't keen.
Great.. interesting and informative. Like the tone of delivery. All good. Thank you.
Beautiful buildings! Love them!
A Rivers of London shout-out! Awesome! That's my favourite book series, very well researched it seems, and it's always great to hear more about how it ties back to the real London.
I think there is a beautiful lyricism to Goldfinger's high rise housing projects. But that's me, I prefer composition over artifice. And I love concrete.
And beautiful presentation, thank you for creating awareness.
Please do the youtube poll glitch to grow your channel more. People need to see your awesome content
I'd like to know more about this resident cooperative you mentioned at the end. How did it come into being? How does it work? How does it hold up against other forms of rent/ownership in its immediate surroundings?
These are really interesting videos, thank you.
I really enjoy your witty humour especially when it comes to building designs around London please make more keep up the good work 👍 please make more videos 🤫
These are fascinating videos. I love learning the history of these buildings and the areas around them. Some of my fathers family lived in Popler many years ago and before these horrors were built. (Think ‘Call the Midwife’ era) I’ve subscribed. Thank you.
Always seemed to me as if Midwife - on the telly at least - was more Limehouse and Stepney.
@@highpath4776 Yes, they could be. But I’m sure I’ve heard them mention Popler. Whatever, they were very deprived areas indeed. And my father used to often mention Limehouse.
I love the occasional brutalist building. Not all Tower blocks are a failure. Really intrigued by the 'lookout tower. Can't bear building to not offend. '
How many parts are there. Just the two. Still I do like the history of what you explain about buildings, architects and transportation in London. Fascinating.
I worked in Kensal Road and walked past this through the Cheltenham Estate on the way to work everyday. These days I'm more likely to walk through Cheltenham...