V-TOUR | Public Housing London: Bankside & Southwark

Housing in London is a critical issue. In recent years, a worsening crisis of affordability has spurred the city’s boroughs to again create housing for themselves and today they are working with architects and communities to deliver some of the best anywhere in the capital.

As part of a season of events exploring the legacy of the public sector on the built fabric of the city, urban historian Mike Althorpe aka The London Ambler hosts four walks for The London Society exploring the history of affordable housing through the experiences of four London neighbourhoods charting physical change, local context and the evolution of domestic design and typologies.

Free from the regulations and oversight of The City, London south of the Thames developed in a unique and different way. Once market gardens and tenter grounds belonging to the Bishops of Winchester, the neighbourhoods of Bankside and Southwark became carved up between the frenetic competing and shifting needs of industry, commerce and railways with housing and living space squeezed between them.

In this v-tour, The London Ambler explores public housing and contrasting examples of model dwellings and estate layout in a disputed and fragmented landscape from cliff face affordable tenements and slab blocks to character cottages and garden squares.  

In the build up to this event, please feel free to share via social media:       #LondonSociety2020
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