16 Warley Way

Summary

Detached house in the International Modern style, designed in 1934 by Oliver Hill FRIBA, built in 1935, with later C20 alterations.

Reasons for Designation

16 Warley Way, a detached house in the International Modern style, designed in 1934 by Oliver Hill FRIBA, built in 1935, with later C20 alterations, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:

* it was designed by Oliver Hill, an eminent architect with several other listed modernist houses to his name, including Joldwynds in Holmbury St Mary (1932, Grade II), Holthanger, now Cherry Hills, in Virginia Water, Surrey (1935, Grade II), and Landfall in Poole, Dorset (1935, Grade II*);

* it is an early example of modernist domestic architecture in England, one which is unusual and of interest as a smaller, more modest design which aimed to reach a wider audience and clientele;

* as a well-realised and accomplished modernist house in which the subtlety of its planning, with good attention to the use of space and light, and the incorporation of Hill’s characteristic curved lines combine to create a wholly original design;

* Hill’s characteristic simple internal treatment, including unbroken wall surfaces, pitch-pine block floors, flush-face doors with plain surrounds, polished Biancola window cills and built-in cupboards, still survives;

* its internal plan-form survives largely intact, reflecting both the requirements and ideas of the best modern houses of the period, in which small and compact, but not cramped, exemplified a modern way of living.

Historic interest:

* as part of the speculative, ambitious, but never completed Frinton Park Estate.

History

The Frinton Park Estate was conceived as a planned seaside resort. It started to take form in 1934 when the South Coast Development Company purchased 200 acres of land straddling the railway line to the north-east of Frinton. Following the establishment of a management company, Oliver Hill (1887-1968) was chosen as the consultant architect. Hill studied at the Architectural Association and began in private practice in 1912. After the First World War he became one of the most conspicuous eclectic architects working in a series of fashionable modes, including neo-Georgian and vernacular. However, after a visit to the Stockholm Exhibition in 1930, where he was inspired by the work of Gunnar Asplund, which showed the exciting effects that could be obtained from colour and lightweight materials, Hill converted to modernism. He wrote later of the exhibition that ‘it marked an important stage in the evolution of the contemporary style, not only on account of the purity and individuality of the buildings…but because here, for the first time, the style could be judged in a world of its own, instead of being seen piecemeal in a few isolated examples’. The real starting point in Hill’s domestic work, after an extension to a house in Kingsgate, Broadstairs in 1932, was Joldwynds in Holmbury St Mary, Surrey (listed Grade II), which was completed in the same year. The overriding architectural feature at Joldwynds, mainly a curved façade with a central, circular stair-tower, was repeated at the Midland Hotel in Morecambe, Lancashire (1933, listed Grade II*), and at Holthanger, now known as Cherry Hill, in Virginia Water, Surrey (1935, listed Grade II).

Hill is thought to have started working on the plans for Frinton after returning from a holiday in Monte Carlo. Fired with enthusiasm for modernist continental architecture, he drew up ambitious plans for 1100 houses, a town hall, college, churches, railway station, shopping complex, and a sweeping cliff-face hotel. Although neighbourhoods of different housing styles were to be built, including Tudor and Elizabethan, 40 acres to the east of the railway line, and closest to the sea, were designated as a showcase for modernist houses. Hill's concept was for prospective owners to purchase a plot of land and then work with an architect to design a new house from a list he had personally drawn up. As Hill was insistent on employing a number of younger and more progressive architects, several well-known modernists were included on his list, including Thomas Tait, Wells Coates, Maxwell Fry, Frederick Eschells, Marshall Sisson, and Connell, Ward and Lucas. However, some of the more hard-core modernists, like Berthold Lubetkin and FRS Yorke, declined to work on the project as they were unable to accept the regime of conventional construction (rendered brick, not concrete) imposed by the developers.

Despite Hill’s best intentions, the project foundered as the majority of potential buyers were put off by modernist designs and the Estate's insistence on flat roofs. Consequently, in an attempt to seduce a suspicious and conservative public, it was agreed to build a number of show homes. Although 50 were planned, only 25 were built, with another 15 built to order, the majority of which were designed by JT Shelton, the estates resident architect. By the end of 1935 however, the project had foundered, with many of the architects, including Hill, having resigned. Only part of the shopping centre and around 40 modernist houses had been built by this date. Of the 12 houses designed by Oliver Hill, 10 still survive, including the estate office, known as The Round House, along with Seaspan, 4 Audley Way, and 55 Quendon Way, all listed at Grade II. Local agents and developers Tomkins, Homer and Ley subsequently took over sales and new designs. After the Second World War the remainder of the estate developed to a rather more modest plan, with the bungalow being the prevailing housing type.

16 Warley Way was designed in 1934 by Oliver Hill and built the following year as one of the Estates 50 planned show homes. It is essentially a mirrored version of 4 Audley Way, both following the standard design Hill developed for many of his Frinton Estate houses. Its ground floor comprised a large living room with a dining recess, a kitchen and maid's bed-sitting room. The first floor contained three double bedrooms (two opening on to sun balconies), two single bedrooms and a separate bathroom and lavatory. Subsequent alterations to the house, including the removal of the original metal-framed casement windows and tubular steel balcony rails, were reversed in the late C20.

Details

Detached house in the International Modern style, designed in 1934 by Oliver Hill FRIBA, built in 1935, with later C20 alterations.

MATERIALS: of white-painted rendered brick with metal-framed windows and a bituminous felt roof.

PLAN: the house is of two-storeys and roughly L-shaped on plan, with a sweeping curve to the front (north-east) elevation, and a flat roof.

EXTERIOR: the left-hand side of the principal elevation is characterised by a sweeping segmental curve with mid-C20 strip windows to the ground-floor living room and first-floor principal bedroom. To the left-hand side of the ground-floor window there is a plymax front door with a port-hole window and to its left are two late-C20 port-hole windows inserted into the blocked-up entrance of the integral garage, all sheltered by a first-floor sun balcony. To the right-hand side of the ground-floor window there is a loggia with a metal-framed glass door with horizontal glazing bars. To the right again a plymax door with a port hole window set within a rendered brick surround provides access to the rear of the house. On the first floor there are two sun balconies with late-C20 tubular steel rails to the right- and left-hand side of the principal bedroom window; the left-hand side balcony is accessed from both the principal bedroom and double bedroom over the former garage by metal-framed glass doors, while that to the right-hand side is accessed from a further double bedroom by a metal-framed glass door with sidelights, all the doors with horizontal glazing bars.

The ground floor of the rear elevation has an off-centre left plymax door with a port-hole window to the former maid's bed-sitting room; a concrete hood links it to a small fuel store. Sitting to the left of the door is a single-light casement with top opening lights and to its right a pair of mid-C20 French windows with horizontal glazing bars. To the right again is a pair of single-light casements with top opening lights. Projecting at the right-hand end is the former integral garage with late-C20 sliding glass doors replacing its original rear wall. On the first floor there is a three-light staircase window to the off-centre right, and to its left is a further three-light casement with side-hung outer lights placed slightly higher up in the walling. To the left again, the rounded corner to the side elevation is turned by another three-light casement with side-hung outer lights. At the right-hand end, the flat roof to the projecting garage was transformed into a sun balcony in the late C20, with contemporary tubular steel rails and metal-framed French doors with horizontal glazing bars.

The right-hand return has a two three-light casements with side-hung outer lights on the ground floor. On the first floor there is, from left to right, a two-light casement with side-hung outer lights, a port-hole window, a three-light casement with side-hung outer lights, and a single-light casement with horizontal glazing bars. The left-hand return has a late-C20 garage adjoining its ground floor and a three-light casement with side-hung outer lights above.

INTERIOR: the interior throughout is still characterised by Hill's simple treatment, with unbroken wall surfaces, plain surrounds to flush-faced doors, pitched-pine block floors and polished Biancola window cills.

The front door gives access to an entrance hall where the wood block floor is arranged in a parquet pattern, from which all other rooms on the ground floor can be reached directly. To its right, into which the parquet floor continues, is an L-shaped living room with a recessed dining area at the inner end, adjacent to the kitchen, although the original serving hatch between the two has now been blocked up. It retains an original fireplace with a marble effect surround, the opening edged in silver. To the left of the entrance hall is a long, narrow lavatory, and to its right a kitchen which has been opened out into the former maid's bed sitting room, both with wood block floors laid in a running bond brick pattern, although the kitchen is now fitted modern kitchen units.

A dog-leg staircase with half-landing rises between the lavatory and kitchen and contains a series of curves: around the end wall at ground-floor level, around the stairwell, and in the solid balcony and handrail where it turns around the stairwell to meet the first-floor corridor.

On the first floor there are five bedrooms set around the landing and corridor, with two double bedrooms and a single double bedroom placed over the living room and former garage respectively, and two single bedrooms above the now enlarged kitchen. All the double bedrooms retain their original built-in cupboards (none were provided in the two single bedrooms), and the linen cupboard in the corridor also survives, all with original flush doors. The separate bathroom and lavatory have now been combined to create a single bathroom with modern sanitaryware.

Sources

Books and journals
Powers, Alan, Oliver Hill: Architect and Lover of Life, 1887-1968, (1989), 35-37, 73
Abbott, J, Modernism in Metroland Mini Guide No. 1: The Frinton Park Estate, (2022)
Jarvis, S, Frinton Past, (1999), 112-118
A Planned Seaside Resort, Frinton Park, Essex, Designed by Mr Oliver Hill in Country Life, (17 August 1935), 182, xxiv, xxvi, xxviii
Phillips, R, Houses for Moderate Means, (1936)
Smithells, R, Modern Small Country House, (1936)

Websites
Information on the Frinton Park Estate from the Modernism in Metroland website, accessed 8 December 2023 from https://www.modernism-in-metroland.co.uk/blog/metro-land-on-sea-the-frinton-park-estate

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