Excalibur Estate

File:Excalibur Estate, 1948.jpg

After the London Blitz of the Second World War, London faced a severe housing shortage. To quickly alleviate this problem, London, like many other British cities, set about building temporary prefabricated houses.

An estimated fifteen hundred homes in Lewisham were destroyed in the first year of the war alone. The level of destruction across many British cities brought about the passing of the Housing (Temporary Accommodation) Act 1944, which led to the building of Excalibur and many estates like it.[https://web.archive.org/web/20110820061247/http://www.telegraph.co.uk/property/8701977/Bulldozers-home-in-on-historic-prefab-estate.html Telegraph, paragraph 5]

The Excalibur Estate was constructed on parkland in Catford between 1945 and 1946 by German and Italian prisoners of war. The estate consisted of single-story prefabricated bungalows designed by the Ministry of Works; each with two bedrooms, a private garden and an indoor lavatory.{{cite web|url=http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/sonia-zhuravlyova/the-end-is-close-for-pala_b_1992269.html |title=Sonia Zhuravlyova: The End is Close for Palaces for the People |publisher=Huffingtonpost.co.uk |date=2012-10-20 |access-date=2013-06-02}}

Many prefabricated estates survived for much longer periods of time. Many corporations replaced such estates with conventional-build or permanent prefabricated council houses throughout the 1950s, 60s and early 1970s. Unusually, Excalibur survived to the 2010s.{{Cite web|url=https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@51.4352997,-0.0033949,3a,75y,42.68h,82.3t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sTKtYuTlmHqWfFGSNRF_2rg!2e0!7i13312!8i6656?hl=en|title=Google Maps|website=Google Maps|access-date=2017-03-16}}Taken March 2013.

The streets on the estate are named after characters from Arthurian legend. The precise reason for these street names is unknown.{{Cite web |date=2011-01-02 |title=Largest postwar prefab estate to be demolished |url=http://www.theguardian.com/society/2011/jan/02/postwar-prefab-houses-demolition-london |access-date=2022-12-09 |website=the Guardian |language=en}}

File:St-marks-church-catford.jpg roof.]]

The estate consisted of 189 single storey, two-bedroomed prefabricated bungalows constructed by the Uni-seco company. The nearly flat roofs have a 7 degree pitch. There were no amenities situated on the estate except for the church, St. Marks. This building originally consisted of two huts, constructed on site in the conventional manner with a sheet-metal barrelled roof, similar to an Anderson shelter.

The nearest railway station to the estate is Bellingham.

The London Borough of Lewisham proposed to demolish and replace all of the properties on the {{convert|12|acre}} site from 2013, using the developer L&Q. As they were the last large inhabited collection of prefabricated houses of this era, this decision proved controversial.

Conservationists fought to save the estate from demolition, which they claimed was a unique surviving example of twentieth-century architecture. They succeeded in seeing Grade II listing applied by English Heritage to six buildings, including St. Mark's Church, exempting them from demolition. The conservation action was spearheaded by the Twentieth Century Society, which claimed that the overall layout and planning of the estate was key to its uniqueness, and that to conserve only six buildings, to be surrounded on all sides with new houses, did not suffice.[https://www.theguardian.com/society/2011/jan/02/postwar-prefab-houses-demolition-london Telegraph, paragraph 3] Despite the Twentieth Century Society campaigning for the entire estate to be made a conservation area and English Heritage recommending 21 buildings be listed, the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport would only go so far as to list six of the buildings. Under listing guidelines for twentieth-century buildings, only buildings with few moderations should be listed; in the case of Excalibur, most buildings had modified windows and doors. A prominent local resident favouring conservation stated: "The Excalibur Prefab Estate is the largest of its kind now left in Europe. Europe values its war time history, we on the estate think it’s time we did too."{{cite web|last=Boogie |first=Doctor |url=http://www.nothingtoseehere.net/2008/03/the_excalibur_estate_london.html |title=The Excalibur Estate, London |publisher=Nothing To See Here |date=2008-03-09 |access-date=2013-06-02}} Emily Gee of English Heritage said of the estate: "The historical resonance of the estate is considerable. The design of the buildings, with their subtle modern influences, and the community-focused planning of the estate testifies to the thoughtfulness of post-Blitz reconstruction."[https://web.archive.org/web/20110820061247/http://www.telegraph.co.uk/property/8701977/Bulldozers-home-in-on-historic-prefab-estate.html Telegraph, paragraph 7]

Lewisham Council rebutted claims that the houses had historical significance and maintained that it would be "virtually impossible to bring them up to modern standards, a view shared by a number of residents, who were mainly council tenants."{{cite web |title=Largest postwar prefab estate to be demolished |date=2 January 2011 |website=The Guardian |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230421043133/https://www.theguardian.com/society/2011/jan/02/postwar-prefab-houses-demolition-london |archive-date=21 April 2023 |url-status=live |url=https://www.theguardian.com/society/2011/jan/02/postwar-prefab-houses-demolition-london}} The council repeatedly argued that residents favour redevelopment, citing a residential poll in which 56 percent voted in favour of redevelopment.[https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2011/jan/06/excalibur-castles-prefab-post-war-demolished Telegraph, paragraph 8] Conservationists have argued this result was inevitable as residents felt there was very little prospect of the council spending any money on their homes, leaving them in outdated accommodation.[https://www.theguardian.com/society/2011/jan/02/postwar-prefab-houses-demolition-london Telegraph, paragraph 11] Of the estate, Lewisham Council stated "We have a responsibility under the national Decent Homes programme to bring all its housing up to a recognised standard. It simply is not financially viable to refurbish the estate."[https://web.archive.org/web/20110820061247/http://www.telegraph.co.uk/property/8701977/Bulldozers-home-in-on-historic-prefab-estate.html Telegraph, paragraph 24] Of the listing, Lewisham mayor Steve Bullock said: "The listing by English Heritage was perverse and it has made me extremely concerned about the way that organisation behaves… These are temporary prefabricated buildings, not architectural gems"[https://web.archive.org/web/20110820061247/http://www.telegraph.co.uk/property/8701977/Bulldozers-home-in-on-historic-prefab-estate.html Telegraph, paragraph 26]

File:Forster Memorial Park (Opened 1922). - geograph.org.uk - 377776.jpg

Campaigners argued that the proposal to build new homes on the site could be subject to legal challenge. Prior to the building of the prefabs, the land was parkland, having been donated by the then Governor-General of Australia, Lord Forster to the then London County Council. In a 1946 letter, the London County Council promised to return it to parkland once the temporary houses had been cleared. When Lewisham council took over the estate in 1965, this letter was then made void, as Lewisham council never agreed to uphold its content.

Documentation by Uni-Seco, the prefab manufacturers and builders, countered the Greater London Authority’s claim that the prefabs had a 10 year lifespan,[https://www.london.gov.uk/sites/default/files/PAWS/media_id_110124/excalibur_estate_report.pdf Excalibur Estate planning report, 2015] stating that the wartime constructions such as those on the Excalibur Estate were not temporary:

War-time building suggests “temporary” construction almost automatically, but war-time “SECO” buildings are by no means temporary in the sense that their life is restricted to a few years. All the basic materials used in the construction of the system are known, well tested in the usage, and, being themselves of a permanent character, it may be reasonably assumed, therefore, that in their combined form they will prove durable over a long period; subject, of course, to reasonable maintenance being given.[https://archive.org/details/SecoUnitSystemGeneralInformationAndDataSheets Uni-Seco prefab system.]

Parts of the original Forster Memorial Park are still in existence to the west of Excalibur. Other housing separates Excalibur from the remaining parts of the park; if the estate was to return to parkland, Forster Memorial Park would thus be divided into two parts by Longhill Road and Battersby Road.{{cite book|title=Philip's Street Atlas London|page=164, grid B1|isbn=978-0-540-09036-5 |last1=Son |first1=George Philip |date=8 February 2007 |publisher=Octopus Publishing }}

In April 2011, Lewisham Council approved a plan to replace the prefabs with 371 new homes, including some social housing. The project was originally set for completion by 2018,{{cite web |url=https://lewisham.gov.uk/myservices/housing/social/Pages/Excalibur.aspx |title=Excalibur |website=lewisham.gov.uk |access-date=22 October 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180914022911/https://lewisham.gov.uk/myservices/housing/social/Pages/Excalibur.aspx |archive-date=14 September 2018|url-status=dead }}{{cite web |url=http://www.lqgroup.org.uk/services-for-residents/media-centre/urban-regeneration/excalibur-estate-regeneration/ |title=L&Q: Excalibur Estate Regeneration Project |publisher=Lqgroup.org.uk |access-date=2013-06-02 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130525154432/http://www.lqgroup.org.uk/services-for-residents/media-centre/urban-regeneration/excalibur-estate-regeneration |archive-date=25 May 2013 |url-status=dead }} but after delays, all the buildings – apart from the six with Grade II listing – are now due for demolition in a number of phases, the third phase beginning in 2024, with the redeveloped estate due for completion by the mid-to-late 2020s.{{Cite news |last=Mulligan |first=Euan O'Byrne |date=20 June 2022 |title=Excalibur Estate: Catford redevelopment enters new phase |url=https://www.thisislocallondon.co.uk/news/19455171.excalibur-estate-catford-redevelopment-enters-new-phase |access-date=16 November 2022 |work=www.thisislocallondon.co.uk }}{{cite web |url=https://www.buildington.co.uk/buildings/6321/england/london-se6/baudwin-road/excalibur |title=Excalibur Catford SE6|website=rphs.org.uk |access-date=19 October 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240519010706/https://www.buildington.co.uk/buildings/6321/england/london-se6/baudwin-road/excalibur |archive-date=19 May 2024 }}

• Forster Memorial Park
• Italian Chapel, Orkney (built by Italian POWs)
• Statue of Romulus and Remus, Beechbarrow, Somerset (built by an Italian ex-POW)

{{reflist}}

{{commons category|Excalibur Estate, Catford}}

• [https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/index.php/Catford Catford] from the OpenStreetMap
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20120825023350/http://jim-blackender.webs.com/ Jim Blackender] Excalibur Prefab Estate Catford
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20110504170045/http://www.dankitwood.com/multimedia/multimedia/ Dan Kitwood] An audio account of a resident
• [https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2012/dec/28/prefab-houses-last-estate-britain Guardian, 28 December 2012] Residents' accounts
• [https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2011/jan/06/excalibur-castles-prefab-post-war-demolished Simon Jenkins, Guardian, 6 January 2011] Excalibur's castles built from postwar dreams must not be demolished
• [https://www.flickr.com/photos/doctorboogie/sets/72157604015214664/ Flickr] Flickr image gallery
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20130525154432/http://www.lqgroup.org.uk/services-for-residents/media-centre/urban-regeneration/excalibur-estate-regeneration/ L&Q], Redevelopment proposals
• [https://www.ribaj.com/culture/excaliburs-end Riba Journal] Excalibur's End

{{LB Lewisham}}

{{Public housing in the United Kingdom}}

Category:Catford

Category:Districts of the London Borough of Lewisham

Category:Housing estates in London