Designing the Seaside: Architecture, Society and Nature

Designing the Seaside: Architecture, Society and Nature Fred Gray

Reaktion Books

£29 hardback 366 pages

Anyone wanting a insight into what makes British seaside towns really special in terms of architecture and design will find Fred Gray’s new book, Designing the Seaside, a useful guide. For an urban designer or planner looking for inspiration the book is worth having in terms of its images alone, as its wealth of photographs, most of them collected by the author, is certainly its strongest point.

Fred Gray is Professor of Continuing Education at the University of Sussex, and the text takes an academic approach, exploring the themes of ‘Architecture, Society and Nature’ as suggested by its sub-title.

He says that seaside architecture and design has been neglected as a serious subject for study. He suggests this reflects its subject matter. Seaside buildings such as piers and beach huts form part of leisure and popular culture, and hence are somehow not so worthy of study. He likens this to the way the suburban bungalow has been dismissed (also a form of building that was devised first for the seaside, he says) as unfashionable. ‘Generally, the topic is not seen as not quite serious by the academy’,

Fred Gray doesn’t say so, but some of this frivolous impression of the seaside might perhaps also be due in no little way to the saucy postcard image that still clings to our many outdated resorts and is a recurrent motif in this book. However, the author has a keen eye for a striking architectural image too, and the book is crammed with large colour photographs that are an excellent reference source for anyone interested in piers, pools, pavilions and seaside images in general.

The most interesting chapters from an urban design point of view are four and five, dealing with buildings (such as the Royal Pavilion in Brighton), and the design of open spaces. Seaside architecture increasingly acquired iconic status in the 20th century, with buildings such as the Blackpool Tower and Royal Pavilion in Brighton standing the test of time. But by the end of the 20th century many, such as the De La Warr Pavilion in Bexhill and grand outdoor lidos, were suffering from neglect and had fallen into disrepair.

Chapter charts the rise (and fall) of the seaside promenade – and although it offers no suggestion as to how we may revive our seafronts, it does show some inspiring examples from the past.

What the book doesn’t do is portray what I would have found a useful area of study, the seaside house and the distinctive residential and suburban streets that are also a feature of our coastal towns. The decline of recent years in the general housing stock and shopping centres of many seaside towns that has seen them fall into poor repair, despite their considerable architectural merit.

Fred Gray’s focus remains on that strip of coast that lies next the sea rather than the hinterland behind. It is this strip of promenade and beach, once perceived as marginal land, that was developed into an area of fantasy and escape in the 19 century – given over to fairgrounds, piers, holiday camps, lidos, casinos and the like.

Non-academic readers might find the text irritating in parts – for example ‘the hegemony of the deckchair was eventually challenged by the sun lounger made of white plastic’ he writes. Or just plain silly. For example, in trying to make a point that holidaymakers (the stress is the author’s) themselves make a direct contribution to designing the seaside he writes that they ‘most obviously compose designs of their own, albeit informal and transitory, in choosing how to use the beach, including, for instance, where to sit or lie, what to do there and what beach furniture from wind breaks to sun loungers, to bring with them.’

Or ‘Western seaside resorts are multi-layered places, redolent with meaning for the present and memory of the past’. Doesn’t this apply to most of our cities and towns, I would ask?

However, these gripes aside, I found the book a fascinating source of information and well worth dipping into. It doesn’t set out to offer solutions to seaside regeneration, nor does it offer case studies of successful resorts, and why they are succeeding.

It is valuable instead for its description of the history and culture of seaside towns, and in giving an overview of how they have been used by holidaymakers over the centuries. It charts the various stages in the rise of the resort, from when the idea of taking a seaside holiday first took root in the 18th century, and also assesses some examples of seaside developments in Europe and the USA, which make interesting comparisons.

Lucy Tennyson

April 2007