Ossulston Estate
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The Ossulston Estate is a multi-storey
council estate Public housing in the United Kingdom, also known as council estates, council housing, or social housing, provided the majority of rented accommodation until 2011 when the number of households in private rental housing surpassed the number in so ...
built by the
London County Council London County Council (LCC) was the principal local government body for the County of London throughout its existence from 1889 to 1965, and the first London-wide general municipal authority to be directly elected. It covered the area today kno ...
on
Chalton Street Chalton Street is a street in the Somers Town neighbourhood of London, England. Chalton Street is over a kilometre long and stretches from Euston Road to almost Camden Town, before taking a hard right turn and terminating at St Pancras Hospital ...
in Somers Town between 1927 and 1931. It was unusual at the time both in its inner-city location and in its
modernist Modernism is both a philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new forms of art, philosophy, an ...
design, and all the original parts of the estate are now Grade II
listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...
s. The estate was built to rehouse those poor who were not being served by the LCC's new suburban estates,Bridget Cherry and
Nikolaus Pevsner Sir Nikolaus Bernhard Leon Pevsner (30 January 1902 – 18 August 1983) was a German-British art historian and architectural historian best known for his monumental 46-volume series of county-by-county guides, ''The Buildings of England'' (1 ...
, ''London'' Volume 4: ''North'',
The Buildings of England ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...
, Harmondsworth: Penguin/New Haven: Yale University, 1998,
p. 380
and was significantly denser to suit the urban site. It was located on the site of the Somers Town slum,John Bold, Tanis Hinchcliffe and Scott Forrester, ''Discovering London's Buildings: With Twelve Walks'', London: Frances Lincoln, 2009,
p. 69
between Euston and St Pancras stations. The original proposal made in 1925 was for 9-storey blocks on the American model, which would have required
lift Lift or LIFT may refer to: Physical devices * Elevator, or lift, a device used for raising and lowering people or goods ** Paternoster lift, a type of lift using a continuous chain of cars which do not stop ** Patient lift, or Hoyer lift, mobile ...
s, and with more expensive flats for private tenants on the highest floors. This was rejected and the height reduced to a maximum of 7 storeys,Cherry and Pevsner
p. 66
with fewer lifts and no private flats. The provision of
central heating A central heating system provides warmth to a number of spaces within a building from one main source of heat. It is a component of heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (short: HVAC) systems, which can both cool and warm interior spaces. ...
was also eliminated, but the buildings were unusual in providing electricity from the start,Cherry and Pevsner
p. 381
and Levita House had the first central heating system installed by the LCC. The design, by
G. Topham Forrest George Topham Forrest, F.R.I.B.A. FGS FRSE (1872 – 1945) was a Scottish architect who became chief architect for the London County Council and was responsible for the design of many public housing estates, and also co-designed two bridges ove ...
, chief architect of the LCC, and his assistants R. Minton Taylor and E.H. Parkes, was influenced by Viennese modernist
public housing Public housing is a form of housing tenure in which the property is usually owned by a government authority, either central or local. Although the common goal of public housing is to provide affordable housing, the details, terminology, def ...
such as
Karl Marx-Hof Karl-Marx-Hof (English: ''Karl Marx Court'') is one of the best-known ''Gemeindebauten'' (English: ''municipal housing complexes'') in Vienna, situated in Heiligenstadt, a neighbourhood of the 19th district of Vienna, Döbling. At over a kilo ...
, which Forrest had visited. The estate consists of blocks grouped around three courtyards, and small
green Green is the color between cyan and yellow on the visible spectrum. It is evoked by light which has a dominant wavelength of roughly 495570 Nanometre, nm. In subtractive color systems, used in painting and color printing, it is created by ...
s, reached by archways from Ossulston and
Chalton Street Chalton Street is a street in the Somers Town neighbourhood of London, England. Chalton Street is over a kilometre long and stretches from Euston Road to almost Camden Town, before taking a hard right turn and terminating at St Pancras Hospital ...
s; some of the original plantings survive. The buildings have some neo-Georgian features in the treatment of roofs and windows, but are modernist in being of steel-frame construction with unornamented roughcast walls, the facades instead enlivened by spatial features such as the archways in front of the balconies which lead to the individual flats. Chamberlain House, three blocks of flats, was built in 1927–29; Levita House, south of it and named for
Cecil Levita Lieutenant Colonel Sir Cecil Bingham Levita (18 January 1867 – 10 October 1953) was a British soldier and public service worker who eventually rose to be chairman of the London County Council in 1928. Career British Army Levita attended the ...
, who was chairman of the LCC's Housing Committee in the 1920s, was built in 1930–31 and consists of the 7-storey section and wings enclosing a grand courtyard which was originally intended to lead to the premium flats. Walker House was begun in 1929–30, but the other side of the courtyard was completed in 1936–37 with more traditional brick 6-storey buildings. The total number of flats was 310. Chamberlain House, Levita House, the southern part of Walker House and the associated shops and The Cock Tavern
public house A pub (short for public house) is a kind of drinking establishment which is licensed to serve alcoholic drinks for consumption on the premises. The term ''public house'' first appeared in the United Kingdom in late 17th century, and was ...
are all Grade II listed buildings."Making a 'slum' into family homes again"
Press release, London Borough of Camden, 8 May 2007, updated 9 May 2007, retrieved 3 March 2011.
Levita House, Attached Shops, Screen And Somers Town Coffee House; Chamberlain House]; Walker House Southern Block Including The Cock Tavern Public House were all listed 13 December 1996. "The Ossulston Estate is the most important inner-city estate of the inter-war period, representing the most considered attempt by the LCC to inject new thinking into inner-city housing estates." In 2004–07, Levita House was extensively refurbished by Sprunt Architects, which included creating larger flats, external refurbishment of the fabric and transformation of the courtyard areas.


References

{{Commonscat, Ossulston Estate Residential buildings completed in 1931 Modernist architecture in London Grade II listed buildings in the London Borough of Camden Housing estates in the London Borough of Camden