The Monstering of Television Centre
I've never worked at the BBC, but I've been to Television Centre, London W12 8QT, several times over the years. The first was in the early eighties, as a child taking part in a record breaking attempt...
View ArticleDing dong merrily on high
Here's one of the Rank Organisation's Look at Life documentaries from the mid-sixties, called Rising to High Office, about the London boom in office blocks. It's set in the newly completed Shell Centre...
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Helvetica Man gets his groove back
Today I went for a stroll around my old home town of Croydon and took some photos. I hadn't realised how much signage remained from the 60s/70s rebuild, but it was lovely to see that Croydon's...
View Article'This land is worth millions'
Heygate Estate residents talk about living on the Elephant and Castle estate and what it's like to be turfed out of their homes for the redevelopment project, which, as one resident rightly says, is...
View ArticleLike a Motorway
A film by John Laing, the builders, on their construction of the 55 miles of the M1 Motorway in 1958. It's a feast of diggers, bulldozers, cement mixers and men with hard hats and clipboards. It even...
View ArticleLiving Tomb
Here's a lovely thing, brought to my attention by @i_like on Twitter: a newspaper created by Rob Mowbray on the rebuilding of Croydon Town Centre between 1960–72.2.2_output_tabloid by Robs Dirty Work...
View ArticleBirmingham in 8mm
Absolutely lovely and slightly trippy (due to the excellent soundtrack) 8mm film of travelling round the motor city of Birmingham in what looks like the early 70s, starting in the city centre by the...
View ArticleThe Smokeless Air of Sheffield
This 1971 film, Sheffield: City on the Move, made by the City Council covers everything from steelmaking and silversmithing, the Pennines and the postwar rebuilding, conservation and municipal sports...
View ArticleJack Nicholson pops by the Brunswick Centre
Short clip from Antonioni's 1975 Palme d'Or winning film The Passenger, starring Jack Nicholson. The film's locations include the Sahara desert, Barcelona, Seville and London. While in London there's...
View ArticleA Secret Urban Forest
In the week of Chelsea Flower Show, here's a film made a couple of miles away: of the 450 trees gone wild in the largely abandoned Heygate Estate in the Elephant and Castle.Having wandered around there...
View ArticleNew Roads for Even Newer Roads
Two Rank Look at Life films on Britain's roads, the first New Roads for Old from 1959 recording the building of the first motorways, the second High Wide and Faster from 1963, when it's all about...
View ArticleRuncorn – the view from Canada
In 1973 Canadian director Michel Régnier made the film British New Towns, about Runcorn and Basingstoke. Someone's uploaded the Runcorn film in 4 sections to YouTube and it's well worth a watch.It's...
View ArticleBuild and build and build and build until, ooops, down they come!
Mungos's Medals is a 1961 film directed by John Elder for the Corporation of the City of Glasgow, following the array of Festival of Britain and Saltaire Society awards won by various postwar housing...
View ArticleOpening day at the Festival of Britain
Clifford Hatts was one of the many exhibition designers who worked on the Festival of Britain in 1951. This is a lovely interview with him from 2011, in which he talks about the challenges of getting...
View ArticleWitchcraft vs Brutalism
Great home movie from the mid-sixties showing the massive building works going into the super-modern Friar's Square shopping centre. Also, smashing photos of Wicker Man-style festivities in the...
View ArticleTelly Savalas looks at Birmingham, Aberdeen and Portsmouth
Here's three of Harold Baim's 'Quota Quickie' films from the seventies and early eighties, featuring the suave and persuasive voice-over skills of Telly Savalas, sometime TV detective hero and Bond...
View ArticleThe central point of Centre Point
Centre Point is to be turned into a block of flats. The once controversial office block in St Giles, London, was designed by Richard Seifert's company in the late fifties for 'the daddy of developers'...
View ArticleDesign in Film – The Modern House
Well, here's a jolly wonderful little montage, eight minutes of the best modernist houses in movie, from North by Northwest to The Ice Storm and The Ghost to The Fountainhead. Lovely to see so many I...
View ArticleBuilding Washington New Town
Here's a great clip from Washington: the First Seven Years, a 1972 film recording the birth of the Durham new town. It's particularly interesting because it shows the small settlements before the new...
View ArticleCrawley vs Toronto
Crawley: A Place to Grow is an early seventies promotional film for the new town. Here a Canadian student (who pronounces the town's name as Craley) meets his English cousins and the town's planners...
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