We explore some iconic parts of London’s past through ‘London Lost Interiors’, a book revealing the great indoors of the UK capital. Plus: a cylindrical example of brutalist architecture, Space House, which has been preserved for future generations. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Hello and welcome to the Urbanist Monocles.
Program, all about the built environment.
I'm your host, Andrew Tuck.
Coming up, interior decoration and design really is an art form, but it's also a very fragile and fugitive one.
We explore some iconic parts of London's past, both interior and and exterior.
They've risked being lost to time or forgotten about entirely.
Firstly, we open a book revealing the historic interiors of the UK capital through a curated collection of archive photography.
Then we look at a shining example of brutalist architecture in the city and what has been done to ensure it's preserved for future generations.
That's all coming up over the next 30 minutes right here on the Urbanist, with me, Andrew Tuck.
Okay, we're going to start today with a look back in time inside some of London's finest interiors that may have otherwise not been accessible to the general public.
Historian Stephen Brindle has recently released a book titled London Lost Interiors, which explores the history of design in the UK capital between 1880 and 1950.
650 black and white archive photographs give readers a window into a lost world, revealing changing tastes in fashion, art and design from the Victorian age to the post war years of austerity.
And I'm happy to say that I'm joined now by Stephen here in the studio.
Stephen, thank you so much for being here.
Now, tell us first of all how you put this together.
There's an archive of all these amazing images, isn't there?
Well, the archive belongs to Historic England.
Used to be half of English heritage before it divided, and before that it was called the National Monument Record.
And it's a vast, vast archive of some something like 8 or 9 million images.
But among them, there are whole individual collections.