Last Shuttle from Chesham

The Last day of the Chesham Shuttle card showing a Metropolitan saddle tank engine pulling into Chesham Station.

Today was a day when railway history was marked on the Chesham Branch of the Metropolitan Railway when the last shuttle from Chesham departed after running for 118 years since 1892. Up to today for most of the day a 4-car train operates as a shuttle service to and from Chalfont & Latimer station, on the main line to Amersham and Aylesbury. In February 2009, following a consultation the previous year, Transport for London announced that Chesham would have a regular through service to central London from Sunday 12th December 2010.

The double track line from Rickmansworth to Chalfont Road (now Chalfont & Latimer) and the single line beyond to Chesham were opened in July 1889. In 1892 the double track was extended from Chalfont Road through Amersham and Great Missenden to Aylesbury, albeit to a temporary terminus in Brook Street as the GWR refused access to its station until 1893. At Aylesbury the line joined the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway which the Metropolitan had acquired in 1891. However this line was not doubled until 1897 when the Metropolitan started to run services from Baker Street to Verney Junction.


The first Metropolitan train at Chesham, July 1889

As I have pointed out before it is probably true to say that there is no Tube Station on London Underground which its community more closely identifies with than this branch line to Chesham. So much so that in 1889 when the railway opened the townspeople raised the funds to have the line built an extra half mile into the centre of town. It meant that this small Buckinghamshire town straddling the valley of the River Chess which gives it its name is directly connected to the West End and City of London; indeed it had its own direct fast trains, the Chesham Flyers, which ran “fast” into the City. Today Chesham has a population of 20,000 and won’t grow any further as it is surrounded by hills which are “Green Belted”, where development is prohibited to maintain green space around London. Indeed, as all the roads into Chesham are steeply sloping there are times in icy winter when the almost 4 miles of the “Chesham Branch” have been its lifeline to the outside world.


Chesham Station

So today at midday an assorted crew of aficionados, local residents, railway enthusiasts and London Underground personalities gathered on the platform at Chesham Station to bid farewell to the shuttle on its last official round trip from Chesham to Chalfont and Latimer. The Chesham Shuttle has been a unique service on this Branch Line and has reinforced the town’s identification with the Underground. Because it has been operated by a small pool of drivers they have a rapport with the residents many of who they know personally. After 118 years the new 8 Car S Stock Trains being introduced in 2011 mean that the 4 car EMU shuttle based on the existing A60 Metropolitan Line Stock is being retired. The new stock consists of 8 connected walk through carriages which cannot be accommodated in the bay at Chalfont and Latimer Station at the other end of the branch. So instead of the shuttle Chesham will have two direct trains an hour into London and Amersham which currently has 6 per hour will reduce to 4 per hour plus the stopping Chiltern Railway services.




The "Last Shuttle" entering Chesham

The current shuttle is designated A60 stock (A for Amersham and 60 representing 1960 their year of planned fleet release). The doorplates on the carriages have the name of their Sheffield manufacturer “Cravens” and the year 1961 but in fact this “1960” stock was only introduced on the Branch in 1962 when sufficient numbers were delivered. These units are the largest trains on the Underground. They are now almost 50 years old and whilst the whole fleet was extensively refurbished in recent years they are operating well beyond their design life, they must have clocked up an incredible mileage.


Interior of A60 Stock


Doorplate on A60 Stock

The new trains which will replace the A60 stock from 2011 are officially called 'S Stock' and they're very different to the Metropolitan's long-serving 1960s workhorses. They will serve around 40 per cent of the Tube network on the sub-surface lines, will have comfort cooling, walk-through carriages with CCTV coverage in each one, plus improved accessibility. The Metropolitan Circle, District and Hammersmith & City lines are known as sub-surface lines because underground sections run just below street level rather than in deep level tunnels.


The new London Underground Sub-surface Stock

The front of the new trains is red, with the destination displayed electronically. The doors are red too, with a button on each which looks like it needs to be pressed to gain entrance. But no, the doors pull apart automatically on stopping at each platform, and with a definite swish rather than a clunk. Oh, and there's only one carriage. Technically speaking there are eight, but they're all joined together to create one long articulated snake allowing passengers to walk all the way from one end to the other if they so wish.




S Stock showing inter-carriage connector

Once aboard passengers will be struck by the space. Traditional Metropolitan line carriages are full of places to sit, and these new replacements most definitely aren't. Most of the seats run along the edge, facing away from the windows, and there are only a handful of 4-somes where family groups might choose to locate. Several of the seats flip up to make way for wheelchairs or pushchairs, or to provide additional standing room if things get too crowded. There are only 30 seats in each new carriage, compared to more than 50 in the old, which is a significant reduction of approximately 150 places to sit in each S Stock train. That's not a problem in the centre of town where journeys are brief and crowding is high. But on the commuter run to Amersham, or Uxbridge, or Watford, not having anywhere to sit for up to an hour is going to frustrate hundreds of post-work travellers daily so it will be interesting to see the reaction of the denizens of Chesham to this feature.


The characteristic London Underground Moquette seat covering for the S Stock

Another innovation inside the carriages may be more welcome - scrolling displays which tell you the train's destination, and which station's coming up next, and whether the train's fast, semi-fast or not. Automated voice messages will played too, which customers on the Met have never previously had to experience. The seats have smart new Moquette, covered in regularly-spaced pairs of pink/purple and yellow/green rectangles. But there are no longer any racks on which to stash your briefcase, nor any hooks on which to hang your overcoat. People of Metroland, your new trains are no longer middle class, they're 21st century egalitarian.


S Stock interior

One feature of the new trains which Bozza Johnson has trumpeted but which I would take issue with is “Air Conditioning.” Well the S Stock spec, according to the manufacturers, calls for the ambient temperature inside the carriage to be 2 degrees Celsius less than the external air temperature when in “cooling mode.” So this is more properly described as “Comfort cooling” rather than air conditioning and as it has to be achieved in a box with three double doors opening every 2 minutes in the central area it is particularly wasteful technology. It also adds weight to the trains which is reflected in the motive power usage and extra complexity which will be reflected in maintenance. For these reasons the new stock has the same carbon footprint as the stock it is replacing, not a great leap forward in energy efficiency after 50 years? There is a lot of media hype each year as lazy editors send pup journalists out to do “meltdown on the Tube” stories but this is a short lived problem and mainly on the deep tube lines where trains can not be “air conditioned.” How does “cooling the Tube” compare as an investment priority with the clear legal obligations and moral imperative to make the system more accessible to the 10% of the population who are disabled or mobility impaired? Air conditioning is inherently wasteful technology developed in days of carbon irresponsibility and the world needs to look for better more sustainable low energy solutions – compare the greedy energy use of Dubai, that fallen icon of vulgar conspicuous consumption, with the city of Chandigarh in India designed by Le Corbusier where every building has its climate controlled without the use of air conditioning.


S Stock trial run on Metropolitan Line

Metroland was the term coined by Metropolitan Railway and taken up by the poet Sir John Betjeman to describe the new green suburbs made possible by this railway – indeed he used a speeded up trip on the Chesham Branch for the opening title sequence of his famous documentary. A century ago, the Metropolitan Railway had been extended from a profitable base in central London through the sparsely populated countryside to the north-west of Buckinghamshire, by Sir Edward Watkin, a contentious Victorian entrepreneur. This push through the Chilterns was part of his ambitious scheme to link Manchester by rail to Paris. Although Watkins’s plans failed with his death, a number of the untoward consequences of his actions fortuitously put his successors at the 'Met' in a unique position to exploit the surplus land adjacent to their lines, under the banner of 'Metro-land'.


The driver of the Last Shuttle

This aspirational promotional campaign created the image of an idealistic post-war lifestyle being based upon the concept of affordable housing of an individualistic character, set in pleasant countryside and yet within easy reach of London by the 'Met'. The propagation of the 'Metro-land' brand led to its wide adoption by the media and incorporation in our culture as epitomising a way of life. Indeed, it was so successful that the Met had to embark on a continuing programme of improving capacity to match the resulting growth in commuting. Set in a convenient countryside, these commuters were catered for by a varied and fascinating railway and the estates it created as part of Metro-land, were immortalised by John Betjeman - becoming part of our heritage.


Dr. Clive Foxell CBE

Well there is no better example of this ideal than the country market town of Chesham nestled snugly in a Chilterns valley and connected to the “Big Smoke” by this historic branch. We were fortunate on the last shuttle to have a commentary from Dr. Clive Foxell CBE on the storied history of the branch. Clive is a former MD of BT and author of many railway and history tomes including “Rails to Metroland.” Being born in Harrow, living in Chesham and having started his career as a railway apprentice he is the Sage of Metroland. After the last official shuttle returned to the platform at Chesham from its trip to Chalfont and Latimer a raffle was held for one of the commemorative headboards with the money raised going to the “Railway Children” charity which London Underground supports. The other headboard is fittingly going to the excellent Chesham Museum. Thanks to Angela Back, General Manager, Stuart Burnett, Performance Manager, and all the Metropolitan Line staff who ensured the end of the shuttle after 118 years was properly marked.


Rails to Metroland

As for Chesham from tomorrow they can look forward to the convenience and comfort of quicker direct trains to the West End and the City of London with step free access at Chesham and no awkward change, delay and exposure to the elements at Chalfont and Latimer. And when the swish S Stock is introduced in 2011 they will have a smoother more comfortable trip again. Maybe a new age of Metro-Land dawns?


Memories and photos being shared at Chesham Station


Chesham Museum site;

http://www.cheshammuseum.org.uk/

For more on Metroland see;

http://www.metroland.org.uk/

For more on Chesham and its railway see;

http://daithaic.blogspot.com/2010/05/chesham-station.html


The shuttle at Chesham Road (now Chalfont & Latimer station) in 1892

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Chesham Station

Chesham Station

The subject of this piece has a connection to the previous one about the first Country House in the Moderne style, High and Over 3 miles away in Amersham-on-the-Hill and Sir John Betjeman’s Metroland as they both featured in that famous documentary. Chesham is at the end of the title sequence for this is where the “Met” train comes to a halt at the end of the opening sequence.

http://daithaic.blogspot.com/2010/05/high-and-over-amersham.html

If you're not familiar with the county of Buckinghamshire, it's something of a surprise to arrive at a small country town and find signs for the London Underground - the instantly recognisable roundel, a circle with a line running through it. At Chesham's charming little station you can board a tube train and travel 25 miles (40.2km) to Aldgate in the City of London via places like Finchley Road, Northwood Hills, Wembley Park and Pinner - the heart of Metroland.The Chesham branch of the Metropolitan Line is as far removed from city life as is possible to get on London Underground.


Chesham Town Clock in the Market Square


Chesham High Street

Chesham is a market town in the Chiltern Hills, Buckinghamshire, England. It is located 11 miles south-east of the county town of Aylesbury. Chesham is also a civil parish designated a town council within Chiltern district. It is situated in the Chess Valley and surrounded by farmland, as well as being bordered on one side by Amersham and Chesham Bois. The earliest records of Chesham as a settlement are from the second half of the tenth century although there is archaeological evidence of people in the area from around 8000 BC. The town is known for its four Bs, usually quoted as:- boots, beer, brushes and Baptists, . Chesham's prosperity grew significantly during the 18th and 19th centuries with the development of manufacturing industry. Chesham Building Society, the oldest such society in the world opened for business in 1845.




Along the platform

It is probably true to say that there is no Tube Station on London Underground which its community more closely identifies with for the people of Chesham raised the funds to have the station built into the centre of town. It means that this small Buckinghamshire town straddling the valley of the River Chess which gives it its name is directly connected to the West End and City of London; indeed it has its own direct fast trains, the Chesham Flyers, which run “fast” into the City. Today Chesham has a population of 20,000 and won’t grow any further as it is surrounded by hills which are “Green Belted”, where development is prohibited to maintain green space around London. Indeed, as all the roads into Chesham are steeply sloping there are times in icy winter when the almost 4 miles of the “Chesham Branch” have been its lifeline to the outside world.


Chesham Shuttle formed of 4 carriages of Metroplitan A Stock

The line to Chesham was for a while the terminus of the Metropolitan Railway. When the Met pushed out from Harrow and Rickmansworth in the 1880s, Chesham was the destination. There were proposals to link on from Chesham to the main London Euston to Birmingham line around the Tring area. Indeed, some land north of Chesham station was acquired for this purpose. I wonder if Watkin the then Chairman of the Met had a wry smile to himself when the people of Chesham actually raised funds to locate the station in a more central location as opposed to the proposed station in the Waterside area. If Watkin already had plans to extend beyond Chesham, he must have been delighted to receive the funds from the good folk of Chesham to extend the railway to central Chesham. The line from Chalfont Road (now Chalfont & Latimer) was single track, it being double up to Chalfont. When the main line was diverted through Amersham to Aylesbury, the line to Chesham became a branch line.


London Underground's Metropolitan Line today Click for a larger image

Chesham lies at the end of a branch of the Metropolitan Line, which opened in 1889. Together with nearby Amersham, it's one of London Underground's furthest outposts. Work began on extending what was then known as the St John's Wood Line beyond central London during the latter years of the 19th century. By the mid-1880s the railway had become known as the Metropolitan, running 17½ miles (28km) from Baker Street. The plan was to continue the line all the way to Aylesbury, but financial problems restricted its extension at that time to Chesham. Chesham is in Travelcard Zone 9 (previously zone D). It is situated 25 miles (40.2km) North West of Charing Cross, making it the furthest station out from Central London anywhere on the London Underground network (using Charing Cross as a central point). It is also both the northernmost and westernmost London Underground Station. Chesham replaced Ongar as the farthest station when the latter closed in 1994.


The Ticket Hall

Most of the land for the new sections of railway was acquired from the Duke of Bedford and Lord Chesham, but the land for the final half mile (800m) of the Chesham branch was presented to the railway by local residents to enable a station to be built in the centre of the town instead of on the outskirts, as was originally planned. In May 1889 the people of Chesham were invited to inspect the branch and afterwards entertained to a banquet. Seven weeks later, the line from Rickmansworth to Chesham was opened. For the next three years, until the main line from Chalfont and Latimer Station to Amersham and Aylesbury was opened in 1892, Chesham was the Metropolitan's most northerly terminus.


Chesham Signal Box

There were many plans to link the Town of Chesham with the railway network, including a branch by the LNWR off the main London to Birmingham line from Tring, but all these come to nothing. So it was left Edward Watkin, Chairman of the Metropolitan Railway to deliver the rail connection which the town needed. It also built a branch to Chesham in 1889 an important destination in its own right as well as aiming at an eventual link to the LNWR at Tring. Because of the plans for extension the station and the presence of the goods yard, Chesham used to have no fewer than three tracks (though only two platforms) and all three tracks remained well into the seventies (long after the yard was closed) as rather useless sidings. This three track layout may be clearly seen (in the early seventies) at the end of the opening credits of Metroland. Today there is only one platform and one track, the empty space that used to be platform one has now become a floral display.


Metropolitan Railway tank loco at Chesham

There is no station starter signal at Chesham. A set of co-acting signals are at the start of the Chesham branch. One theory [as to their installation] is that they replaced the single line token and this means only one train at a time is allowed on the Branch. The branch has no intermediate stations and has the longest distance between adjacent stations on the network at 3.89 miles (6.26 km). Chesham station is the least used station on the Metropolitan Line at 429,000 passengers per annum. It is a popular starting station for those participating in the Tube Challenge. Chesham is in Travelcard Zone 9 (previously zone D). It is situated 25 miles (40.2 km) north west of Charing Cross, making it the furthest station out from Central London anywhere on the London.


The Shuttle on the Branch

Chesham takes an inordinate pride in the “Chesham Flyers.” There are two 8-car through trains to Aldgate (during the morning rush hour) and two returning through trains in the evening rush hour but for most of the day a 4-car train operates as a shuttle service to and from Chalfont & Latimer station, on the main line to Amersham and Aylesbury. In February 2009, following a consultation the previous year, Transport for London announced that Chesham would have a regular through service to central London from 2011.

When steam was replaced on the Branch the then new A60 stock formed the rolling stock for the line (although other electric stock made an appearance in the early days of the electric service). A four car unit was used to form the shuttle to and from Chalfont. A new bay platform was built at Chesham to allow the shuttle train to be at Chesham when a through 8 car service was operating in the rush hour. This bay platform has been removed which means that if the through trains are late, the shuttle has to wait at Chalfont for the line to clear.


Leaving Chesham

Today the approach to Chesham is up from the High Street along an unprepossessing Station Road. The station buildings are small with a bench in the sheltered ticket hall and toilets and a bicycle store for commuters. London Underground’s obsession with “Capital” projects rather than staffing can be garnered from this short single platform boasting no less than 11 CCTV cameras. Whilst the station staffing hours are limited the shuttle drivers know many of the locals and have a definite bond with the line and the town. Indeed the friendly driver that day offered me a cab ride down to Chalfont and Latimer which unfortunately I couldn’t take up.

There are many relics of days gone by looking around the station. There are the derelict sandbox buffers on the abandoned bay siding, the water tank recalling when the steam trains filled up here and for a station without signals a very splendid “signal box.” But the eye is drawn down the track to the throat out of the station under a bridge and disappearing around the curve and this holds the secret of Chesham, a charming small town which is good to live in and grow up in connected to the “Big Smoke” by this unique, special, historic and still essential branch line.

High and Over, Amersham

“In 1931 all Buckinghamshire was scandalised by the
appearance, high above Amersham, of a concrete house in the
shape of a letter “Y”.

It was built for a young professor, by a young architect, Amyas
Connell . “I am the home of a 20th Century family”, it proclaimed,
“that loves air and sun and open country”
It started a style called moderne”

Sir John Betjeman – Metroland


Entrance Hallway



In his usual wonderful epigrammatic style (in the video at the bottom of this article) the former British Poet Laureate sums up why High and Over is so important, the first and still the greatest English house in the Modern Style pioneered by Le Corbusier, an incredibly confident first commission for its 28 year old New Zealand born architect, Aymas Connell. I had not been down to see the house which is 12 miles from where I live in some years because, frankly, the vandalism of the setting by English planning philistines depresses me. When it was built the client, Bernard Ashmole, had acquired 12 acres from the Drake Estate of a bare hillside on the Station Road between the Metropolitan Railway’s Amersham Station at Amersham-on-the-Hill and the Old Amersham commanding views over the storied old town and the lovely Misbourne Valley. Soon 5 speculative “Sun Houses”, also designed by Aymas Connell, were built on the unpaved approach drive guiding visitors like pilotis to a servants lodge with a massive iron gate leading into the ten acre estate surrounding the house. This area contained a water tower, a fives court and 7 fish ponds connected by cascades.


View from High and Over today showing the circular swimming pool.





During WW11 the entrance gate went and when Bernard Ashmole sold the estate in the early 1960’s it all went wrong. The context was destroyed by no less than 50 houses built in a crescent where the fishponds cascaded and High and Over was divided into two houses to successfully save it from demolition. This was the Britain of 80% tax rates and exchange controls and large houses were not in fashion. In front in the ironically named “First Avenue” more box live semi Ds were built to destroy the view which was the raison d’etre for the house being High and Over.


Entrance Front

High & Over is widely considered to be the first and finest house to be built in the Modern style in Britain. Designed in 1929 by Amyas Connell (who later became part of the pioneering architectural practice Connell, Ward & Lucas), and I visited to renew my acquaintance with it as the Grade II* listed house is being offered for sale in its entirety for the first time since it was divided into two properties in 1962.

Modernism was an attempt by utopian architects to redefine the world after the horrors of WW1, by putting usefulness and social equality first. They used new industrial materials and craft techniques to create stark, functional spaces. Pioneers of the movement from the Bauhaus School in Germany included Mies van der Rohe and Le Corbusier. Art deco added a lightness of touch by including echoes of the ocean liner, motor car and aeroplane, and sometimes a dash of the exotic. Think glamour and cocktails.


The main stairwell

"The last great British country house and the first modern house in the English countryside." The House Book, Phaidon, 2001




Today at the entrance to High & Over the original chrome double front doors open into a large, circular, black marble floored hall with a circular balcony overlooking from the first floor. Leading off the entrance hall in one wing is a large triple aspect sitting room with French doors opening out onto a ground floor terrace. A striking dining room, decorated with gold metallic leaf, is in the second wing and in the third wing the kitchen and family room, again with French doors leading out onto one of the ground level terraces.


Dining Room decorated with gold leaf


Living Room

A stunning glass encased spiral staircase leads to the first and second floors where the original aluminium studded door frames and skirting, restored to their former glory, lead to the principal bedrooms. On the top floor a second sitting room leads out onto two spectacular, partially covered roof terraces – these inspired the locals to refer to High & Over as “The Aeroplane House” when it was first constructed – the terraces offer commanding views across to Amersham Old Town and over the Misbourne Valley. Today, High & Over is now set in landscaped grounds of 1.7 acres, principally laid to lawn and bordered with mature trees. To the south-facing rear of the property, steps lead down to the original circular swimming pool. To the east side is a pergola ornate with fragrant jasmine in the summer. To the west side a Garden Playhouse.




Roof Terrace

High & Over has been described by English Heritage, who first listed the house in 1971, as “of outstanding importance as the first truly convincing essay in the international style in England”, further pointing out the fact that is was “one of only two buildings included in the exhibition The International Style held at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, under the curatorship of Henry-Russell Hitchcock and Philip Johnson in 1932”. Alan Powers, the architectural historian has also described the house as “the first major house to be built in the style of the European Modern Movement” (‘The Twentieth Century House in Britain’, p.45).




The client - Sir Bernard Ashmole

This stunning house was something of a sensation at the time it was completed in 1931 and it continues to be a widely celebrated example of Modern architecture to this day. Rather surprisingly the house was commissioned by a professor who specialised in archaeology and ancient history, Bernard Ashmole (who later went on to become director of the British Museum). Despite Ashmole’s academic interest in the past, however, the house designed for him by Amyas Connell (1901-1980) looked firmly towards the future. Ashmole met Connell, a New Zealand-born architect, at the British School in Rome, where Ashmole was lecturing. Connell is well known to have been an admirer of the radical ideas of Le Corbusier, and High & Over (Connell’s first house design) shows a great debt to the Swiss architect whilst still offering a more English appearance of eccentricity. It was a fortuitous meeting for when Ashmole and his wife Dorothy returned to London they wanted to build a country house where he could commute to London and the site below Amersham Underground Station allowed that. I suspect the Ashmole’s came into an inheritance for this was a very expensive undertaking on a young professor’s salary. As for the Modern style being a reaction to the horrors of war Bernard Ashmole was both a survivor of the Battle of the Somme and a very brave man, as you must be to be awarded the Military Cross. Indeed he served in the RAF in World War Two and was honoured for bravery by the Greek Government.



Bernard Ashmole, CBE, MC (1894, Ilford, Essex – 1988, Peebles, Scotland) was a British archaeologist and art historian (M.A., B. Litt., Oxford 1924), who specialized in ancient Greek sculpture. He was Professor of Classical Archaeology, University of London, 1929-1948. He was a collateral descendant of Elias Ashmole (1617–92), eponymous benefactor of the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, where he was briefly assistant keeper of coins.

http://daithaic.blogspot.com/2009/11/oxfords-ashmolean-museum.html

Amyas Douglas Connell (23 June 1901 - 19 April 1980) was a highly influential British architect of the mid-twentieth century. He achieved early and conspicuous success as a student, winning the Rome Prize in Architecture in 1926. Having been impressed by the work of Le Corbusier at the 1925 Paris Exhibition and that of fellow French Modernists Andre Lurçat and Rob Mallet-Stevens, Connell effectively launched the Modernist architectural style in Great Britain.



The house is situated on a prominent hillside with spectacular views over the old town of Amersham and the Misbourne Valley on land that was originally part of the estate of the Tyrwhitt-Drake Family who lived at the nearby Shardeloes. The house was part of a larger scheme that included a gardener's lodge, water tower and generator house set in a garden that combined Cubist elements with the English landscape tradition. It was later joined by a group of speculative houses in similar style - the "Sun Houses."


Section showing the construction in concrete



A contemporary article

The house has a splayed Y-shaped plan with three wings radiating from a central hexagonal hall. This arrangement gives High & Over a very distinctive shape (so distinctive, in fact, that it is said that German pilots used it as a marker for their flight routes during the Second World War). The construction of the house is reinforced-concrete frame, in-filled with cavity wall construction externally of brick and with concrete block internally. All windows are metal, many in steel plated soffits. The site, on a hill in the Misbourne Valley, afforded the house plenty of light, air and views of the Chilterns. High & Over is built in the shape of a "Y". Whether it is an urban myth or not I'm not sure, but I have been told that High and Over during World War II had to be camouflaged as the distinctive shape of the house gave directions to German bombers on their routes to their targets in Britain.


The Sun Houses

The original house was joined shortly after by similar "Sun Houses". When the houses were built they were in the open with fine views over the Missbourne valley. Since then trees and vegetation have grown around the houses. High and Over has appeared on several TV programmes, and was the centre stage of an LWT produced Poirot.

Sun House One





This is first on your right as you go up Highover Park and is well looked after with its original frontage and roof terrace but it has been extended (in the same style) at the rear. It has a “Mackintosh” style sign saying “First Sun House.”

Sun House Two



This is No. 6 Highover Park and is original condition except for the room added over the garage which has an unfortunate splayed support detracting from the purity of the façade. It does have the original style blue/ green patination on the Crittal windows.

Sun House Three



This is the only one in entirely original condition but unfortunately two large trees in front obscure the elevation. It is rented out by the owner so the interior is pretty scruffy.

Sun House Four



Fourth House on the right which has had several extensions and replacement glazing which is near enough but not quiet right. Exterior is not well maintained.

Sun House Five


This is the only one on the left in the splay created by Highover Park and the public footpath. It is currently undergoing a full restoration by a new owner who is also adding on a low one storey pavillion in the same style.

The Lodge



This was the original Gardner’s Lodge which housed the couple who were the Housekeeper / Cook and Driver / Gardner which is why there were no servant’s accommodations in the main house. Today its appearance is execrable with totally inappropriate uPVC glazing ruining the elevations.

The significance of High & Over in the history of British houses was recognised early on as Country Life magazine devoted a large feature to it in 1931. “Here is architecture pure and unalloyed by sentiment, reminiscence or claptrap” wrote Christopher Hussey, the then editor, who also remarked that the building had unfairly “come in for a good deal of hostile comment”.

Hugh Pearman, the renowned architecture critic, visited High & Over in 2005 and noted in The Sunday Times that “despite the fact that some outbuildings, including a water tower and a fives court, have gone, it is still amazing... Here is a house built by two people [Ashmole and Connell] with immense talent and energy”.

The house has also featured in numerous other publications, a selection of which are listed below:

"One of the first houses in the country to accept the style of Le Corbusier". Sir Nikolaus Pevsner

"[High & Over] looks both seminal and fashionable. Connell not only introduced England to the Corbusian vocabulary of flat, white walls, horizontal windows, roof terraces and glazed staircases, but understood it... The house... exudes health and vitality - like Corbusier's Maison Cook or Maison Guggenbuhl transplanted to Bucks." Peter Wylde, The Twentieth Century Society Journal

"[High & Over] quickly compels interest greater than that elicited for any traditional building, and ultimately pleases by the sheer beauty and simplicity of the synthesis of purpose with construction. Here is architecture pure and unalloyed with sentiment, reminiscence or clap-trap. One goes away with a fresh and fertile mind." Christoper Hussey, Country Life (1931)

"High & Over is regarded as Britain's first Modernist and in important example of the International in the UK" 1001 Buildings You Must See Before You Die.

In this early and impressive design, Connell utilises his deep understanding of Roman architecture in a complex reworking of Corbusean modernism, attempting a fusion that would connect the classical and modern worlds. While some British critics interpreted this as muddled formalism, it was a beacon to a younger generation of architects including Alison and Peter Smithson. In 1962, it was divided into two separate dwellings in a (successful) effort to save it from demolition.

THE HOUSE OF A DREAM

Click on picture to play the British Pathe video

In 1931 British Pathe produced a short film about High and Over in its recently completed state, entitled "The house of a dream". The film is introduced with "For centuries houses have been built to meet the needs of each age. Today, we dream of houses open to sun and air, embodying everything that modern science can offer." and it features excellent shots of the interior and exterior.


The 1960s housing enveloping High and Over

In the 1960s a large part of the grounds of the house were sold off to developers and the drive was re-used to make an adopted road, Highover Park, serving approximately 50 1960s detached, semi-detached and town houses. This development had no connection to Connell but the houses do share certain allusions to the modernist style, however they have not worn well and today you see cluttered driveways, wheelie bins and weed ridden patches of gardens. They effectively bore into the back of High and Over ruining its privacy and its setting. This development and other in-fill developments around High and Over during the last 40 years have had an impact on the house's immediate environment and aspects, and new developments still generate considerable public attention and protest about their impact on High and Over. In a recent development the route of HS2 – the High Speed Rail Line to Birmingham is due to be built in a tunnel under First Avenue in front of the house.

But the biggest loss has been the garden. There used to be 10 acres of it, complete with a concrete water tower, squash courts and the fish ponds giving the house seclusion with internal and external vistas. Now, the 1960s housing is there instead. A row of concrete posts fanned out from the house, but were chopped down to make way for the garage. So the garden is much reduced with the circular swimming pool in front of the house and the garden pergola. I think High & Over was lived in nicely until the Second World War but afterwards in austerity and high tax Britain of the 1950's became less of a joy.




Front Door

It is not just the gardens which have been altered but also the interior. If restored, the ground floor could be one of the most staggering interiors in England. The chromium-plated front door used to open onto a hexagonal hall. It was a glamorous space to sail through, with a fountain in the middle that reached up to the ceiling. The three main rooms that opened off the hall had doors that could be folded back to turn the ground floor into one large space. When it was subdivided the wing with the service stairs became a separate house so that today there are too many bedrooms (8) and what was the splendid library reaching into the garden has now been subdivided with a modern kitchen. The gilded Art Deco Dining Room which had double doors (as did the Living Room and Library) opening into the Hallway to give a grand entertaining space is now entered from a side corridor.



There is now a unique opportunity for a rich benefactor to acquire and restore this one of a kind property to its original state, the first and greatest Modern house in Britain.

Savills (www.savills.com) and The Modern House (www.themodernhouse.net ) have it on sale with a guide price of £2,350 k which may seem a lot but for say 3 million restored you would get a modern work of art (and public approval) for less than the cost of an OK painting. Any takers – If you are interested there is an “Open House” on 15th May 2010.




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