Municipal Dreams
@municipaldreams.bsky.social
Social historian of housing. Author of 'A History of Council Housing in 100 Estates' (RIBA Books) and 'Municipal Dreams: the Rise and Fall of Council Housing' (Verso). I blog at https://municipaldreams.wordpress.com/.
🚨 New blog post: How Rotterdam Shaped Social Housing: Part I, the Justus van Effen Estate and ‘Streets in the Sky’
municipaldreams.wordpress.com/2025/11/11/h...
municipaldreams.wordpress.com/2025/11/11/h...
November 11, 2025 at 7:43 AM
🚨 New blog post: How Rotterdam Shaped Social Housing: Part I, the Justus van Effen Estate and ‘Streets in the Sky’
municipaldreams.wordpress.com/2025/11/11/h...
municipaldreams.wordpress.com/2025/11/11/h...
Here's a small taster for tomorrow's brand new blog post ...
November 10, 2025 at 5:11 PM
Here's a small taster for tomorrow's brand new blog post ...
From an article in today's Financial Times. Such an obvious statement of fact. It's hard to understand why direct public investment in social rent housing - so successful for decades - is now unthinkable.
November 10, 2025 at 7:43 AM
From an article in today's Financial Times. Such an obvious statement of fact. It's hard to understand why direct public investment in social rent housing - so successful for decades - is now unthinkable.
Ashbourne Town Hall, originally designed in Italianate style as a market hall by Benjamin Wilson in 1861; the headquarters of Bakewell Urban District Council from 1894. There are a lot of improvement works in the town at present; they'll be impressive when finished.
November 9, 2025 at 7:12 PM
Ashbourne Town Hall, originally designed in Italianate style as a market hall by Benjamin Wilson in 1861; the headquarters of Bakewell Urban District Council from 1894. There are a lot of improvement works in the town at present; they'll be impressive when finished.
Ashbourne War Memorial, erected in 1922 to commemorate 110 casualties of the First World War at the entrance to the new War Memorial Park containing sports grounds, play areas and ornamental gardens. Side pillars commemorating the 35 local casualties of the Second were added in 1948.
November 9, 2025 at 7:06 PM
Ashbourne War Memorial, erected in 1922 to commemorate 110 casualties of the First World War at the entrance to the new War Memorial Park containing sports grounds, play areas and ornamental gardens. Side pillars commemorating the 35 local casualties of the Second were added in 1948.
There are many ways to remember the sacrifice of the First World War: a reminder of the 120,000 headstones produced by the Hopton Wood Stone Company in Middleton (Derbyshire), carried by the Cromford and High Peak Railway to Commonwealth War Grave cemeteries. #RemembranceDay
November 9, 2025 at 9:07 AM
There are many ways to remember the sacrifice of the First World War: a reminder of the 120,000 headstones produced by the Hopton Wood Stone Company in Middleton (Derbyshire), carried by the Cromford and High Peak Railway to Commonwealth War Grave cemeteries. #RemembranceDay
Boothby Avenue and Cokayne Avenue, Ashbourne, Derbyshire; housing built by Ashbourne Urban District Council. The council purchased Ashbourne Hall and grounds in 1919 and began work on a 90 house scheme the following year under the new Housing Act. Percy Houfton was the council's architect.
November 8, 2025 at 10:49 AM
Boothby Avenue and Cokayne Avenue, Ashbourne, Derbyshire; housing built by Ashbourne Urban District Council. The council purchased Ashbourne Hall and grounds in 1919 and began work on a 90 house scheme the following year under the new Housing Act. Percy Houfton was the council's architect.
This week's Substack post looks a the Honor Oak Estate in Lewisham, built as a slum clearance estate in the 1930s. A marginalised community, stigmatised by some but a proud respectable community for many of its residents.
municipaldreams.substack.com/p/the-honor-...
municipaldreams.substack.com/p/the-honor-...
The Honor Oak Estate, Lewisham: ‘A warning for planners’
To some, the Honor Oak Estate is better known as Tenement Town, one of the London County Council’s largest interwar block estates and one of its worst.
municipaldreams.substack.com
November 8, 2025 at 8:49 AM
This week's Substack post looks a the Honor Oak Estate in Lewisham, built as a slum clearance estate in the 1930s. A marginalised community, stigmatised by some but a proud respectable community for many of its residents.
municipaldreams.substack.com/p/the-honor-...
municipaldreams.substack.com/p/the-honor-...
Reposted by Municipal Dreams
🚨 New on Substack: my post on the Honor Oak Estate, Lewisham - to some 'a successful endeavour to provide suitable hygienic accommodation for the poorer classes' and to others 'a warning for planners’
municipaldreams.substack.com/p/the-honor-...
municipaldreams.substack.com/p/the-honor-...
November 6, 2025 at 8:27 AM
🚨 New on Substack: my post on the Honor Oak Estate, Lewisham - to some 'a successful endeavour to provide suitable hygienic accommodation for the poorer classes' and to others 'a warning for planners’
municipaldreams.substack.com/p/the-honor-...
municipaldreams.substack.com/p/the-honor-...
Reposted by Municipal Dreams
Reminds me of Newtongrange, Midlothian. The Lothian Coal Company built the village using subsidiary building companies. Tenants/employees kept in check by heavy-handed paternalism. The Dean pub, run as a Gothenburg pub, is still community owned.
#coal #mining #housing
flic.kr/p/2pNkeDD
#coal #mining #housing
flic.kr/p/2pNkeDD
Newtongrange: The Square
Terraced miners houses around the Square. "The first phase of new pit cottages were built between 1890 and 1905 by the Newbattle and Whitehill Building Company, a subsidiary of the Lothian Coal Compa...
flic.kr
November 6, 2025 at 9:01 AM
Reminds me of Newtongrange, Midlothian. The Lothian Coal Company built the village using subsidiary building companies. Tenants/employees kept in check by heavy-handed paternalism. The Dean pub, run as a Gothenburg pub, is still community owned.
#coal #mining #housing
flic.kr/p/2pNkeDD
#coal #mining #housing
flic.kr/p/2pNkeDD
🚨 New on Substack: my post on the Honor Oak Estate, Lewisham - to some 'a successful endeavour to provide suitable hygienic accommodation for the poorer classes' and to others 'a warning for planners’
municipaldreams.substack.com/p/the-honor-...
municipaldreams.substack.com/p/the-honor-...
November 6, 2025 at 8:27 AM
🚨 New on Substack: my post on the Honor Oak Estate, Lewisham - to some 'a successful endeavour to provide suitable hygienic accommodation for the poorer classes' and to others 'a warning for planners’
municipaldreams.substack.com/p/the-honor-...
municipaldreams.substack.com/p/the-honor-...
From my train for those in the know.
November 5, 2025 at 11:12 AM
From my train for those in the know.
From my train for those in the know.
November 5, 2025 at 11:12 AM
From my train for those in the know.
1/ New Bolsover, Derbyshire: a model village built between 1891 and 1896 by the Bolsover Colliery Company for its workers to the designs of Arthur Brewill and Basil Baily. It comprised a double horseshoe of houses arranged around a central 'village' green and also included ...
November 4, 2025 at 7:09 PM
1/ New Bolsover, Derbyshire: a model village built between 1891 and 1896 by the Bolsover Colliery Company for its workers to the designs of Arthur Brewill and Basil Baily. It comprised a double horseshoe of houses arranged around a central 'village' green and also included ...
Reposted by Municipal Dreams
@municipaldreams.bsky.social appears to have been in Derby of late so - some Trusteel system housing construction from the c.1947 official handbook "Spotlight on Derby" showing the 21-house constructed by the Corporation's Building Works Dept as part of the post-war housing drive.
flic.kr/p/2rDuo3f
flic.kr/p/2rDuo3f
November 4, 2025 at 2:21 PM
@municipaldreams.bsky.social appears to have been in Derby of late so - some Trusteel system housing construction from the c.1947 official handbook "Spotlight on Derby" showing the 21-house constructed by the Corporation's Building Works Dept as part of the post-war housing drive.
flic.kr/p/2rDuo3f
flic.kr/p/2rDuo3f
Here's the excellent programme of the Writeidea Festival organised by Tower Hamlets Council, 21-23 November. All events free but need to be booked. (If you look carefully, you'll see I'm playing a bit part alongside the estimable @peteapps.bsky.social.)
www.ideastore.co.uk/whats-on/wri...
www.ideastore.co.uk/whats-on/wri...
Writeidea Festival
Check out East London's FREE reading Festival run by the Idea Store.
www.ideastore.co.uk
November 4, 2025 at 2:22 PM
Here's the excellent programme of the Writeidea Festival organised by Tower Hamlets Council, 21-23 November. All events free but need to be booked. (If you look carefully, you'll see I'm playing a bit part alongside the estimable @peteapps.bsky.social.)
www.ideastore.co.uk/whats-on/wri...
www.ideastore.co.uk/whats-on/wri...
This research and the planning vision it reveals is really quite something ...
London's Ringways are a whole network of unbuilt urban motorways threaded through the capital. There's never been a complete map of them,not even one made by their designers, until now. Today we're publishing the Ringways Map from @roads.org.uk to let you see in the city that London nearly became.
November 3, 2025 at 7:37 PM
This research and the planning vision it reveals is really quite something ...
1/ I need some local experts to properly decipher this 1860 boundary marker for the Borough of Derby for me but it's a wonderful insight into the patchwork nature of local government in the mid-nineteenth century.
November 3, 2025 at 5:42 PM
1/ I need some local experts to properly decipher this 1860 boundary marker for the Borough of Derby for me but it's a wonderful insight into the patchwork nature of local government in the mid-nineteenth century.
Reposted by Municipal Dreams
Another informative, witty and intriguing podcast from John Grindrod. If you don’t listen to Monstrosities Mon Amour…you really should. It’s good for you and you will enjoy it and…well you just should. So there. That’s it.
Municipal Dreams supremo John Boughton champions 60s expanded town Thetford in the latest episode of Monstrosities Mon Amour
podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/m...
podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/m...
Monstrosities Mon Amour: Thetford with John Boughton
Podcast Episode · Monstrosities Mon Amour · 30/10/2025 · 28m
podcasts.apple.com
November 3, 2025 at 9:43 AM
Another informative, witty and intriguing podcast from John Grindrod. If you don’t listen to Monstrosities Mon Amour…you really should. It’s good for you and you will enjoy it and…well you just should. So there. That’s it.
I always enjoy Modern Mooch's rambles - usually some historical and contemporary photography and a bit of history, all going to offer a perspective into some usually unheralded piece of public architecture. Here he is on Manchester's Brunswick Estate:
modernmooch.com/2025/11/03/b...
modernmooch.com/2025/11/03/b...
Brunswick Estate – History
1813 1836 1900 2025 Manchester Historical Maps I was walking around town, with a view to updating my Ardwick Walk. Idle curiosity took me toward the Brunswick Estate – that pocket of housing …
modernmooch.com
November 3, 2025 at 5:00 PM
I always enjoy Modern Mooch's rambles - usually some historical and contemporary photography and a bit of history, all going to offer a perspective into some usually unheralded piece of public architecture. Here he is on Manchester's Brunswick Estate:
modernmooch.com/2025/11/03/b...
modernmooch.com/2025/11/03/b...
Reposted by Municipal Dreams
In WWII they had discussion groups - even the soldiers were paid to discuss things and had specialist publications provided for them via the Secretary of State for War. cambridgetownowl.com/2025/11/01/h... Can we bring back this wartime innovation? (ie local discussion groups).
How the British Army educated war time soldiers in democracy and civics
On the weapon on enlightenment, and what we can learn today on democracy education in an era of disinformation. Pictured: The Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority – AKA IPSA esta…
cambridgetownowl.com
November 3, 2025 at 3:21 PM
In WWII they had discussion groups - even the soldiers were paid to discuss things and had specialist publications provided for them via the Secretary of State for War. cambridgetownowl.com/2025/11/01/h... Can we bring back this wartime innovation? (ie local discussion groups).
Some late 16th century modernism: 'Hardwick Hall, more glass than wall', Derbyshire.
November 3, 2025 at 6:54 AM
Some late 16th century modernism: 'Hardwick Hall, more glass than wall', Derbyshire.
This week's Substack post tells the story of Brighton's interwar council housing. There's a new post every Thursday in your inbox if you subscribe.
municipaldreams.substack.com/p/brightons-...
municipaldreams.substack.com/p/brightons-...
November 2, 2025 at 9:14 AM
This week's Substack post tells the story of Brighton's interwar council housing. There's a new post every Thursday in your inbox if you subscribe.
municipaldreams.substack.com/p/brightons-...
municipaldreams.substack.com/p/brightons-...
Reposted by Municipal Dreams
This is me with the wonderful @grindrod.bsky.social talking about the London overspill town of Thetford - 60s' optimistic progressivism incarnate - and ... white bread. Enjoy.
open.substack.com/pub/johngrin...
open.substack.com/pub/johngrin...
Monstrosities Mon Amour: Thetford with John Boughton
#11. John Grindrod meets Municipal Dreams writer John Boughton to explore the expanded and maligned Norfolk town of Thetford and the wonders of white bread.
open.substack.com
October 31, 2025 at 7:14 AM
This is me with the wonderful @grindrod.bsky.social talking about the London overspill town of Thetford - 60s' optimistic progressivism incarnate - and ... white bread. Enjoy.
open.substack.com/pub/johngrin...
open.substack.com/pub/johngrin...
Light show, St Oswald's Church, Ashbourne, Derbyshire.
November 1, 2025 at 6:39 PM
Light show, St Oswald's Church, Ashbourne, Derbyshire.