Listen in as historians Holly Smith and John Grindrod tell the story of High-Rise Housing in Britain. www.mklitfest.org/podcasts #upintheair #housing #britishhistory @grindrod.bsky.social @holsmith.bsky.social @versobooks.bsky.social

Join historian Holly Smith and writer John Grindrod for an evening exploring the origins, history and legacy of Britain's tower blocks. www.mklitfest.org/upintheair @grindrod.bsky.social @versobooks.bsky.social @holsmith.bsky.social #highrise #builtenvironment #housing

Have a listen to this new episode of Open City’s De-constructed podcast! I talked with @matthewlloydr.bsky.social about England’s first ever council housing cooperative - a bold experiment in tenant control in 1970s Wapping 🧱🛠️✊ open.spotify.com/episode/3hiS...

I'm really delighted to have been reviewed so thoughtfully by David Kynaston this week, who paints an excellent picture of the stories and nuances of high-rise Britain www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-...

The ups and downs of high-rise living

‘On BBC 2 last Monday,’ noted the Sunday Telegraph’s TV critic Trevor Grove in February 1979, ‘the return of Fawlty Towers was immediately followed by a programme about faulty towers.’ He went on: Thi...

spectator.co.uk

I'm very proud of this book: it has a wonderful array of work by many of my favourite historians, which cumulatively makes the pitch for understanding modern British History through the lens of the urban. Lund Humphries have done a wonderful production job, & it is a big beautiful book. Buy it now!

Lund Humphries@lhartbooks.bsky.social · 8mo ago

OUT NOW! The Modern British City 1945-2000, ed. by Simon Gunn, Peter Mandler and Otto Saumarez Smith, brings together architectural, urban and social historians, to chart the extraordinary changes that took place in British cities between the end of the Second World War and the early 21st century.

Launch event for the Modern British City at @c20society.bsky.social on 26th of January: secure.c20society.org.uk/Default.aspx... Do come! The book is out with @lhartbooks.bsky.social next week.

Drawings of new tower blocks amid the scruffy jumble of Victorian terraces in Netherthorpe, Sheffield, by John Piper - June 1961. Reproduced B&W in the Architectural Review, but I’ve always longed to find full-colour originals.

I’m in this week’s @newstatesman1913.bsky.social with a review of Holly Smith’s brilliant history of house rise council housing in Britain, Up in the Air www.newstatesman.com/culture/book...

Repopulating the high-rises

A new history of Britain’s tower blocks reveals the ways architecture and ideology have combined to ensure residents are always forgotten

newstatesman.com

My book UP IN THE AIR: A HISTORY OF HIGH-RISE BRITAIN is out today!

Catch me in the @theguardian.com today, on the history of high-rise housing. We need to remove the distorting goggles of prejudice in order to understand Britain’s extraordinary high-rise heritage. Consider looking up afresh! www.theguardian.com/artanddesign...

Thumping ambition – and demolition: 10 high-rises that changed modern Britain

Eyesores and scandalously unsafe? Or utopian housing for the working classes? Here are the stories and scandals behind some of the UK’s most revolutionary homes

theguardian.com

I’m beginning an archive digitisation project + looking for a high-quality portable/handheld scanner…. any recommendations?

You can get 25% off my book UP IN THE AIR: A HISTORY OF HIGH-RISE BRITAIN at Waterstones, with the code SUMMER25 until Thursday 31 #WPreorder

Does anybody have experience applying for the National Lottery’s Community Fund? Seeking advice & examples of successful past applications - gratefully received!

My book is out on 28 October with @versobooks.bsky.social 💥 It’s available for pre-order at £20: www.waterstones.com/book/up-in-t...

do i know anybody with a good camera who might be willing to take a picture of a newspaper page at the british library for me? needs to be 300dpi at least... imaging and scanners still down after cyberattack :( can pay! ££

does anybody know of an archive for the Guardian where I can access page numbers for articles post 2010? Gale, ProQuest and Lexis all seem to have given up paginating for contemporary articles?!

Historians of bsky... I'm looking forward to helping put together this exciting new conference at the new Queen Mary Centre for British Studies. Call for papers deadline is 24th January! ⌛

QMCBS@qmcbs.bsky.social · 2y ago

Quick reminder about our conference, 'British History Today, 1-2 May 2025. Further details will appear on projects.history.qmul.ac.uk/qmcbs/. Deadline for papers is 24 January 2025. There have been many great ideas for panels, papers and novel formats already

I've stepped in to give @TheSAHGB seminar on 5th of December, with a talk titled 'Swedophilia: Ethic or Aesthetic? Oliver Cox, Michael Ventris and the Lure of Swedish Architecture in Post-War Britain'. I'll be showing lots of Oliver Cox cartoons. sahgb.org.uk/whatson/swedop…. Come!

Picked up an outrageously cheap copy of James Stirling’s Black Book of buildings and projects (1975). Wonderful pictures of a personal favourite building, the Cambridge History Faculty @camhistory.bsky.social - this is where I learned how to be a historian ♥️

I’m giving a lunchtime talk on Britain’s community architecture movement for the Bartlett’s Situating Architecture Lecture Series at UCL - talking about self-build, squatting + student protest 🧱🔧 Come! 📍 1pm, Monday 2 December www.ucl.ac.uk/bartlett/arc...