John Lewis Womersley CBE, FRIBA, FRTPI, Hon. LL.D. and MA (12 December 1909 – 28 October 1990) was a British architect and town planner known for his work as City Architect for Sheffield, leading the team that created the Gleadless Valley, Hyde Park and Park Hill estates, but also infamous for Manchester's vast Hulme Crescents, whose design faults led to them becoming unlettable and their demolition after only twenty years. Womersley's passion was "incorporating buildings, roads, paths, play-grounds, schools and superb landscaping as the complete architectural environment."Womersley, J. L. (1965) "Architecture as a Complete Environment". Paper to the Architectural Association, 9 February 1965
Principles
Working under a Labour local government, Womersley believed strongly in creating a better, more egalitarian society through the re-building of post-war Britain. He believed that ordinary people deserve and benefit from thoughtful planning and good architecture,Dale, S. (2015). "Falling in love again with city’s best modernist architecture Park Hill Flats". Yorkshire Post, 13 June 2015. improving tenants’ living experience through the preservation of woodland and separating pedestrians from road traffic. In a letter to The Times (8 July 1965) Womersley laid out his ideas about the coexistence of man and machine:
Traffic should serve not master people. Urban motorway proposals should include careful analysis of the human unhappiness and environmental destruction that will result.
Womersley was dedicated to providing social housing that improved not only quality of living, but quality of life. His housing estates in Sheffield and Northampton were laid out in "crisp and modern style"Harman, R. & Minnis, J. (2004). Pevsner Architectural Guides: Sheffield. London: Yale University Press. with "detail and care often missing from later social housing."Jones, A. & Matthews, C. (2011). The Future is Northampton. Jones the Planner, 12 June 2011. The scale of urban transformation that Womersley invested during his time in Sheffield remains unique in this country, his department committed to, "creating houses for working people as monuments for future generations rather than shamefaced hutches."South Yorkshire Archaeology Service. (2008). South Yorkshire Historic Environment Characterisation: Final Report. South Yorkshire Environmental Characterisation Project.The Housing Development Committee of the Corporation of Sheffield. (1962). Ten Years of Housing in Sheffield. Sheffield: City of Sheffield Printing Department.
One of his constructions, Park Hill, at the time of its construction was considered "a brave, enlightened approach to housing – people coming across the world to see it. We are unlikely ever again to see architecture, let alone housing, delivered in such a confident and optimistic way."Satwinder Samra. Quoted in Ramchurn, R. (2013). Jack Lynn Dies at 86. In Architects’ Journal, 24 October 2013. When it was built it was considered an "ambitious inner city development"
Delivering a paper to the Architectural Association in 1966, Womersley stated that architectural design and human experience are not mutually exclusive, "If we are to have satisfaction again we need to make original design once more the primary force in town and country planning, making an attempt to produce something significant for today when judged by those of tomorrow.".
Womersley's Local Authority office invested in building schools, churches and other public buildings that were valued locally, but it was their social housing that became of world importance. With his team, Womersley was able to pioneer new building technologies that fostered creativity that placed Sheffield in the forefront of social housing, culminating in the city hosting the RIBA annual conference in 1963.Jones, Peter Blundell (2008). University of Sheffield School of Architecture 1908–2008: A Centenary History. Sheffield: University Print Service.
Training
Womersley was born before the First World War and, in his youth, would have been aware of the hardship endured by ordinary people during the Depression Years through unemployment, poor housing and bad living conditions in the tightly packed Industrial cities of the North. His father, a Huddersfield cloth designer, was unable to see the potential in his son and declined to fund his university education. At Huddersfield School of Architecture, Womersley received a rounded basic training in practical design, building construction and professional practice.Duerden, P. (2005). Northampton with Vision, 22 October 2005. Retrieved 1 April 2019 at http://www.northamptonwithvision.co.uk/tour.htm He was mentored by Norman Culley, First Head of the school. Writing in his obituary, Womersley described Culley as a man who "had that vital spark that turns a teacher into a leader: boundless enthusiasm, perpetual youthfulness and the power to enthuse and inspire."Womersley, J Lewis. (1969). Obituary of Norman Culley, June 1969. Both men shared the belief that in order to produce buildings that are worthy of heritage, the architect must strive for ‘beauty through simplicity.’Womersley, J. L. (1963) Productivity for What? Speech to the RIBA Conference, Sheffield.
Following his study of Architecture, Womersley completed a degree in Town Planning and developed a keen interest in the work of the Garden City Movement and sought to emulate for his generation the high qualities of housing layout and amenities achieved in Letchworth and Welwyn Garden City. He became a powerful supporter of the movement to create a better, more egalitarian society in the re-building of war-devastated Britain.
Early career
After qualifying, Womersley spent some time working in London, where he designed an underground restaurant in Golders Green, complete with sprung dance floor. He was awarded a Nicholson Travelling Scholarship by the West Yorkshire Society of Architects in 1933, which gave him the opportunity to travel to Europe, sketching buildings in Paris, Rome, Florence and Venice and hillside towns. This was a key experience for Womersley, who was to repeat this trip some twenty years later, this time accompanied by Sheffield City councillors, in a journey that would inspire the city planning in the renewal of Sheffield. He left London to become Herbert J. Rowse's Principal Assistant in the Liverpool practice of Bradshaw, Rowse and Harker, designing municipal buildings in St. Helens and Fylde and working in the redevelopment of parts of Liverpool and Birkenhead.Morris, Ivor. (1987). J.L. Womersley. Yorkshire Architect Centenary Year. February, 1987. He married a school teacher, Jean Roberts, who he met whilst walking in Bridge of Orchy in the Scottish Highlands. Together, they had two sons, Richard (1944–1985) and John Womersley (1941–2017).
Northampton
In 1946 Womersley was appointed Borough Architect of Northampton, subsequently being made Borough Architect and Town Planning Officer. Believing that housing should be inseparable from town planning,Womersley, JL. (1965). Architecture as a Complete Environment. Paper to the Architectural Association, 9 February 1965. Womersley's designs included shops, schools, colleges, bus garages, markets, fire stations, libraries, public houses and places of worship. The national housing shortage, coupled with rising building costs necessitated the provision of simple, low cost housing made with good quality materials. On 8 November 1951, the block of four Hopley Houses on Winchester Road, Delapre were ceremoniously opened, providing proof that a terraced house that could accommodate a family of five could be built for £1083,Dream that Became Bricks and Mortar. Northampton Chronicle and Echo, 9 November 1951 p6. one third less than the average cost of council houses of the same type and constructed in three and a half months, rather than twelve.
One of the first to experiment with Radburn Design Housing, 'Hopley' cottage housing was linked by a footpath system separating pedestrians from roads. Driven by his belief that the motor vehicle had the potential to be a ‘wrecker of the environment’ as well as impacting upon the senses of man, Womersley wrote on the design of his Eastfield estate:
In Eastfield, footpaths branching from the pavement of the spine road give pedestrian access to the front entrances of houses along each Green and connect at the other end with the footpaths in the Park. In order to encourage children to play on this, small paved play areas were incorporated adjacent to the branch footpaths… Being as remote as possible from both service roads and the main spine road, these were really safe. Kitchens were planned to overlook the pedestrian ways so that mothers could keep their children in view.Womersley, JL. (1954). Some Housing Experiments on Radburn Principles. The Town Planning Review, Vol. 25(3) pp. 182–194. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press.
Trees were carefully preserved, houses being grouped around them. Similar attention to detail is evident at King's Heath, Dallington Fields and his other estates. It was in Northampton that Womersley's first ‘point block’ was built, the 10 storey St. Katherine's Court, balancing the limitations of space with housing shortage and allowing people to walk a short distance to work, unmolested by traffic. This was Womersley's first venture into building upwards: multi-storey living. Womersley's drawings of the layout and dwelling types were passed on to his successor, Brian Bunch, who succeeded him as Northampton Borough Architect ad Town Planning Officer in 1953.
Sheffield: flood the valleys, plant the tops
With W.G. Davies, Womersley had designed the now Grade II listed building, High Storrs School, Ecclesall, in 1933. In 1953, he returned to the city, having been selected from 40 competitors for the post of City Architect of Sheffield. The specification was created in the post-war 1952 Development Plan, which identified 20,000 unfit houses in a plan to relieve overcrowding in heavily industrial areas of Sheffield. The plan estimated that 2,700 acres would be required to house the population, although there were only 2,400 acres available. The inhabitants of the slums were removed to council estates on Hallamshire, with the impact upon the tenants of costlier rents and longer distances for them to travel to work.Escher, L. A. (1981). A Broken Wave: The Rebuilding of England 1940–1980. London: Penguin. It became apparent, following a failed application for the city boundaries to be extended, that the pre-war density of population would need to be addressed. The main challenges were the need for slum clearance, a shortage of land on which to house the population and the immobility of heavy industry. In order to re-house most people near to their original homes with adequate space in an attractive environment, use had to be made of land that was considered too steep for development using a combination of high and low rise buildings.The Housing Development Committee of the Corporation of Sheffield. (1962). Ten Years of Housing in Sheffield. Sheffield: City of Sheffield Printing Department.
Laying out his vision, Womersley made the commitment that:
If we are to design cities and not merely housing we must go beyond the individual dwelling and portray the grand design.
He led Sheffield Council leaders on visits to sites across Europe, to share his vision of "an audacious programme of building around the city." What he was about to achieve in one decade was the first benign urban transformation on a scale of a city of over half a million people that we had ever seen in Britain.Escher, L. A. (1981). A Broken Wave: The Rebuilding of England 1940–1980. London: Penguin.