Earlier this year, I visited the Birmingham suburb of Bournville for the first time. Planned and developed by the Cadburys in the 1890s, the estate is explicitly modelled on an ideal of the English village, with the mostly semi-detached houses playing a set of variations on the theme of the cottage. Consulting Pevsner as I walked around, I was surprised to find that, normally rather sniffy about the various forms of imitation and revival that make up most modern English domestic architecture, he was almost enthusiastic about the style of these placid, unambitious dwellings. 'Gradually,' he noted of the growth of the Bournville development, 'a few satisfactory basic types of house were evolved to suit the way people want to live.'

LRB 19 November 2009 | PDF Download