For our June meeting we welcomed Ana Francisco Sutherland, architect and founder of Francisco Sutherland Architects based in Blackheath and Chair of the Blackheath Society. Ana became fascinated by the architectural history of Blackheath and the number of post-war buildings of architectural merit. She soon discovered a network of collaborating practitioners living locally who had been attracted to the area by existing examples of Georgian architectural excellence, the natural topography of the area and the developmental opportunities arising from war damage. In 1973, the South London Society of Architects noted in its newsletter that ‘the most striking concentration is the 97 [architects] at Blackheath, a postal district over-architected to the tune of 38 to the square mile’! Ana’s fascinating talk highlighted the Span developments between 1954 – 1984 by the Busby & Lyons team, the first development being Foxes Dale comprising three storey townhouses set around a traditional square and selling for £6,000. Corner Green was apparently Lyons’ favourite development on the Cator Estate. The Hall was developed on the site of a Victorian villa and includes the sculpture in Hallgate, the Architect in Society, representing the pressures on the architect during the process of design and development, particularly from the planning process. Ana also touched on the work of Trevor Dannatt (the Quaker meeting house), Chamberlin Powell & Bon (who were to go on to work on the Barbican and Golden Lion estates, after designing the Vanbrugh Park estate), Andrews, Emerson, Sherlock & Keable (Rangers Square), Michael Hohmann & Leo Rubinstein (Westgrove Lane), Royston Summers (North Several and Orchard Drive), and Julian Sofaer. Ana concluded by drawing our attention to the crossroads at Pond Road where there are examples on each corner of Victorian (St Michael’s), Span and Georgian architecture as well as a house designed by Peter Moro. To find out more, you might like to pick up a copy of Ana’s beautiful book Modern Buildings in Blackheath and Greenwich and join us for a guided walk led by Ana next month. Thank you Ana for such a fascinating talk.
