Relics
ARCHITECTURE
Mow Cop, of course, did not erupt; and there were no rich Americans. But none the less there is real quality in Britain's nineteenth-century in- dustrial architecture: parts of Stoke and Buislem are in the same class as the castles that Edward I built along the coast of Wales. They are beautiful and interesting and dripping with insights into the way our forebears lived. Give the age of auto- mation and supermarket architecture a few more years to run, and a remarkable industrial town- scape overflowing with the romance of Britain's industrial heyday should be irresistible. People will campaign for it as they do already for Georgian terraces.
It is now only thirty years since the Georgian Group was founded, but already the artefacts of the Georges are widely and blindly admired. The Victorian Society has been going for seven years, and is headed down the same path to certain acceptance and respectability. The only obstacle in its way is the possibility that all traces of Victorian Britain may have been swept away by the time the society reaches its thirtieth birthday. In Staffordshire, for instance, the failure of Mow Cop to erupt and create another Pompeii in the Potteries means that fewer than forty bottle kilns now survive. Once there were hundreds and hundreds, as the postcards that can still be bought in Newcastle-under- Lyme show.
These record the derision with which hoity- toity residential Newcastle looked down on its grimy leeward neighbours. 'Stoke Stokes,' is the caption of one infernal view of smoke and kilns. The change of air Soots me well at Stoke on Trent,' says another, in a parody of cards sold at Blackpool and Scarborough.
Needless to say, such cards were never sold in the towns where the pottery was made. People whose lives were blackened by the out- pouring of thousands of belching flues could not be expected to boast about it, and nor, understandably, do they yet feel romantic about the buildings that brought them fame. Even Wedgwoods, who are pretty public-relations-con- lacious, never lifted a finger to preserve Josiah's Works at Etruria when they moved to Barlaston.
Mr A. R. Mountford, director of the city museum at Stoke, told me : 'Now that the Potteries are in a smoke-abatement area, there is no reason for keeping the old works—and unless there is sufficient pressure to preserve one or more bottle kilns, I very much fear it won't happen.' Mountford would like to get his hands on an entire pottery, kilns, ovens, work- shops, offices and all. He thinks there are one or two left and that one of them would cost about £40,000 to buy and convert into an industrial museum. Only last week the museums committee of Stoke Council wrote to several pottery-makers to ask for their views on doing something of the sort. So far, the only pottery to act individually is Spode, which is preserving a bottle kiln built in 1790 so long as it does not stand in the way of the firm's need to grow.
Lack of concern, shortage of money and the need to re-use land in new ways, are the trio 'of difficulties that stand in the way of preserv- ing- the paraphernalia of industrial Britain. At present, the Ministry of Public Building and Works is spending over £2 million annually on maintaining its ancient monuments, and hands out a further £700,000 in grants, but the bulk of this goes to preserving rarities that are mediaeval or older. The ministry has scheduled some industrial relics, which means that public notice has to be given before they are destroyed, but has yet to dip into its pocket to buy one.
As the controversy over the future of St Pancras Station Hotel amply shows, the Vic- torians with their grandiose gestures and prolific output have bequeathed us a real night- mare. In the first place, how do we decide what should be saved and, if a particular building takes our fancy, what is to be done with it? Museums may be a let-out in some cases, but we would have more museums than pubs if all the interest- ing and valuable nineteenth-century buildings were used for that purpose. Thanks largely to the needling of the Council for British Archae- ology, the necessary first step of listing important industrial relics has started. The survey, begun by the Ministry of Works, has now been turned over to the CBA. It is being done by a lone man of re- tiring age, Rex Wailes, a leading authority on wind and water mills, with local voluntary help where available from bodies such as architectural schools.
But listing is not enough, new uses must be found for old buildings. At King's Lynn, in Norfolk, a fine late mediaeval chantry college is being turned, at vast cost, into a youth hostel and flats for the elderly. The money came from various sources—Historic Buildings Council, Pilgrim Trust, YHA and the Ministry of Education- whioh goes to show that, if the promoters of a rescue operation are ingenious enough, they can always lay their hands on some money. A pottery 1 might be saved if it were turned into studios for art potters, a youth club, a museum for old potting tools and/or a design centre. St Pancras Station is much more difficult, because it is so big and conversion so expensive. If its setting could be improved when King's Cross is demolished, new commercial possibilities might open up. On the other hand, judging by the number of industrial relics that ought to be cherished, it might be, just the right size for the Victorian Society.
TERENCE BENDIXSON
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