Dennis Hardy

England in the early part of the twentieth century was rich in utopian ventures - diverse and intriguing in their scope and aims. Two world wars, an economic depression, and the emergence of fascist states in Europe were all a spur to idealists to seek new limits - to escape from the here and now, and to create sanctuaries for new and better lives. Dennis Hardy explores this fascinating history of utopian ideals, the lives of those who pursued them, and the utopian communities they created. Some communities were fired by a long tradition of land movements, others by thoughts of more humane ways of building towns. In turn there were experiments devoted to the arts; to the promotion of religious doctrine; and to a variety of political causes. And some were just 'places of the imagination'. Utopian England is about just one episode in the perennial search for perfection, but what is revealed has lessons that extend well beyond a particular time and place. So long as there are failings in society, so long as rationality is not enough, there will continue to be a place for thinking the impossible, for going in search of utopia.

Community Experiments 1900-1945

Utopian England

Colin Ward

Sir Peter Hall

E. Howard

To celebrate the centenary of the first garden city at Letchworth, the Town and Country Planning Association has performed a service to planners everywhere by initiating the republication in facsimile form of the very scarce original first edition of To-Morrow. Accompanied by a running scholarly commentary on the text, and by a newly-written editorial introduction and postscript, jointly written by three leading commentators on Howard's life and work To-Morrow will immediately become a compulsory purchase for every serious student and practitioner of planning and for teachers and students of modern social, economic and political history.

A Peaceful Path to Real Reform

To-Morrow

Utopian Thought and Communal Experience

Community Experiments, 1900-1945

The Legacy of a Makeshift Landscape

Arcadia for All

From Canvey Island to Jaywick Sands, from Peacehaven to Pitsea; in the first 40 years of last century, thousands of English families made their own place in the sun, without benefit of councils, planners, architects, building societies, or even builders. Were they, as many planners and environmentalists suggested, making rural slums and seaside eyesores, or were they providing a unique example of unaided self-build housing, with lessons for us all today? Here Dennis Hardy and Colin Ward uncover the history of the 'plotlands' of South-East England, telling the fascinating detail of the places people built for themselves on the coast and in the country, and of what happened to them since, drawing parallels with similar developments in other parts of the world.

This book offers a detailed record of one of the world's oldest environmental pressure groups. It raises questions about the capacity of pressure groups to influence policy; and finally it assesses the campaing as a major factor in the emergence of modern town and planning, and as a backdrop against which to examine current issues.

Dennis Hardy

Books

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