Critical Kent: The Topographies Project: Beaches (2015). Background notes for Explorations of: From Whitstable into the Thanet Coast

This is a wonderful example of how terrain, and the clever development of it, can result in what is, essentially, privatisation. The cliffs are developed as an exclusive, private estate of (what were once) summer houses. The beaches are only accessible by steps from the houses, or through one of the three tunnels which are owned by the North Foreland Estate (only residents are given keys). The ambience is still one of quiet, discrete, wealth in a relaxed rural (bucolic) setting. It was here that John Buchan wrote The 39 Steps (1919) whilst staying in a house on the estate. The final chapter is set in a very similar environment, and draws a great deal of detail from the locality.

It is well documented that the wards of Cliftonville West and Margate Central rank amongst the most deprived wards nationally. The profile of these two wards provides some explanation and background as to the links between the deprivation and the difficulties in dealing with the issues associated with this area. The following information provides indicative evidence of a much wider problem across the two wards where the combined effect of all these issues have led to an area that is suffering from high levels of crime and anti social behaviour, and a lack of cohesion in the community with a negative impact on the community and public services.

(https://thanet.gov.uk/publications/housing/selective-licensing-scheme-2012-2016/the-profile/)

I think Cliftonville is one of the most depressing places in England that I have ever visited. There is very clear evidence of what was once a ‘genteel’ area, indeed it was the up-market suburb of Margate. In the 1920s, when TS Eliot was in Margate, it was actually at a hotel in Cliftonville that he stayed – walking to the other side of Margate to sit in the shelter where he wrote lines for The Waste Land. Now the grandiose houses and once-hotels are subdivided into bedsits, and there hangs over the area a sense of not only desolation but despair. All who live here do so because they cannot afford anything else, or have been ‘placed’ here by local authorities seeking cheap accommodation for those from whom they have some (statutory) responsibility for – the homeless, children in care, refugees etc. It is almost a mockery – the contrast between the pretensions of the once grand buildings and the lived reality of their now inhabitants.

Unsurprisingly, the depiction of this area on film is one of isolation, despair and violence – the latest (premiered September 2015) is Jamie Thomson’s Lost Choices.

There are attempts to bring the revival/gentrification of east Margate around the headland and into Cliftonville/Walpole Bay – the Walpole bay hotel being one example. But it has yet to have, if it ever will, any real impact on the area…

Down by the sea is also a series of abandonments – the closed lift which connected cliff top to beach and the Victorian tidal pool. And, most prominent of all, the carcass of:

The Lido:

From http://margatearchitecture.blogspot.co.uk/2008/09/clifonville-baths-granted-listed-status.html

The complex of buildings on the site are of two distinct phases: an early-C19 sea bathing establishment, dating from 1824, called the Clifton Baths; and a C20 lido, dating from 1926, called the Cliftonville Lido from 1938. The structures are on four levels, the lower levels excavated from the chalk cliffs and only the upper level, on the landward side, above ground level.

The Clifton Baths were constructed between 1824-8 by John Boys at a cost of £15,000 and excavated from the chalk cliff north-east of the harbour. An engraving of c1829 shows a Gothick style fort-like structure with a massive arch at sea level, buildings above with lancet windows, crenellated parapet and an obelisk-shaped chimney. A detailed description was published in 1830 by George Alexander Cooke, probably based on a visit three or four years earlier. A large domed circular chamber provided storage for 20 to 30 bathing machines which were brought down a curving tunnel to sea level when required. A tunnel also led to the lower reservoir used as a plunge bath for women and children. A horse pump forced sea water from the lower reservoir to the upper reservoir where it supplied the water for hot baths, the power supplied by a horse gin in the open air. An obelisk-shaped chimney served the boiler but was removed in the later C19. A Bathing Room divided into two wings, the north for gentlemen and the south for ladies, had seven hot baths, shower baths and hip baths but was later demolished. There was a Waiting Room which was also a reading and subscription room and a newsroom which also had an organ and billiard table. The upper terrace had round-headed alcoves, seats and benches for enjoying the sea views. A bathers' terrace was erected by 1831 and a second chimney was erected between 1833- 45.

In 1849 ownership of the Clifton Baths passed to John Boys' son, John Harvey Boys. A map of the Margate Sanitation survey of 1852 shows the subterranean plan of the Clifton Baths with the circular dome, a passage leading off to the north-east, a reading room, bathing room, reservoir, tank and horse pump and further subterranean passages. An engraving of circa 1860 shows a further obelisk-shaped chimney had been built by this date.

In 1869 the site was sold to Thomas Dalby Reeve who built a drill hall for the local Artillery Volunteers and a boiler house with tall chimney. These are shown on Bacon's map of Margate of 1875. In 1876 electricity was used to generate ozone, believed to be beneficial to bathers. In the 1880s an indoor salt water swimming pool was provided at the north-east corner of the site. This appears on the 1907 Ordnance Survey map and survived until the mid-C20. By 1903 a cinema had been installed into the former Drill Hall, operational until 1929. In 1924 a theatre or concert hall was built east of the indoor swimming pool but was later demolished.

From 1926 onwards the Clifton Baths were re-modelled under John Henry Iles, a leading figure in the amusement park industry between the wars, who also owned the Dreamland Amusement Park. It was turned into a large modern seaside complex with bars, cafes and restaurants on several storeys and a large open air swimming pool built out into the sea. These buildings were built on to and over the existing Clifton Baths in a Neo-Classical style with Mediterranean influences, laid out over a series of terraces. The Clifton Baths boiler house chimney was adapted with the addition of a large sphere (probably intended to be a lamp), to be an advertising feature for the new complex.

The lido was a semi-circular shaped pool constructed of concrete which held 1000 bathers and could be emptied and filled every day with the ebb and flow of the tide. At the landward end it had an amphitheatre for 3000 people and adjoining promenades and cafes. It had slides, diving boards and moored floats. The changing rooms, comprising lockers and timber changing cubicles, were located under the promenade and tiered seating of the open air swimming pool.The Cliff Bar was erected beside the sun terrace and the interior scheme was often re-decorated. The Cliff Cafe, which could seat 1000 people with entertainment provided by orchestras on a circular stage, was erected underneath the the Cliff Bar and much of the Sun Terrace. The Cafe Normandie was a large cafe where dances were held, destoyed by a great storm in 1953 and replaced by the Echoes Nightclub. The French Bar, in existence by 1933, was damaged by fire in 1953 and is now a small bar at the east end of Echoes Nightclub. In it is a painted timber doorway blocking the lower end of the earlier Clifton Baths bathing machine tunnel and next to this part of the flint retaining wall of the Clifton Baths Bathers Terrace. The Jolly Tar Tavern, to the south of the Cafe Normandie used the blocked up mouth of the Clifton Baths lower reservoir as an arched alcove behind the bar. Under the Cafe Normandie was constructed the Cafe Basque by 1929 which had plaster scenery. Currently this is inundated at high tide. On the upper terrace, the south range, west of the boiler house had 50 private bathrooms providing ozonised sea or fresh water treatments. By 1929 hair dressing salons had been erected at the west end of the range, later used as a snooker club.

In 1938 the Clifton Baths were renamed the Cliftonville Lido. After the Second World War, circa 1948, the private bathrooms in the south range of the lido were closed and replaced by an aquarium and mini-zoo, a billiard hall and by 1949 a puppet theatre. During the storm of 1953 the open air swimming pool was damaged and the Cafe Normandie wrecked and replaced by the Golden Garter saloon, used for a Wild West type show. By 1962 a nightclub called the Cavern Disco had been established in the dome. By circa 1965 the Cliff Bar was re-decorated with a Caribbean theme and renamed the Jamaica Bar. Circa 1971 the Cavern Disco was renamed the Hades discotheque. In the late 1970s the Echoes Nitespot replaced the Golden Garter Saloon. A turf accountants was built by 1974 above the bar at the west end of the south range. The open air pool closed in 1977-8 and was filled in with sand.

Most of the structures above ground level are buildings constructed for the lido, with the exception of the eastern building of the south range, which is the remains of a circa 1870 drill hall with attached boiler house and chimney.

https://www.facebook.com/Cliftonville-Lido-Action-Group-136654829810683/timeline/

The struggle over the lido is interesting – it has now been ‘saved’ by having been listed – but it is actually the pre-lido underground structures which are protected by the listing. How possible or easy will it be to attract investors with redevelopment plans? And how can this area ever be ‘improved’ whilst it remains a mouldering, decaying empty site? And what must it have been like to have an asset like this when it was up and running - and at its (when?) best?

Drive along sea front into Margate, Turner Contemporary is one your right as you come out onto the front. Park.

JW Turner – one of his Margate paintings: ‘The New Moon’ (1840) (Tate Britain.)

Margate was in the forefront of sea bathing in the 18thC when bathers were taken into the sea in carts, before a fully developed bathing machine appeared, c. 1753, designed by Benjamin Beale (a Quaker). His main innovation was the addition of a modesty hood at the rear of the bathing machine, enabling the bather to enter the sea unobserved (as well as offering some protection from wind and waves). In the late 18thC c30 to 40 bathing machines were recorded as in use at any one time. The development of ‘sea bathing’ from the beach augmented the bathing rooms (now under the lido), from which a bather descended an external staircase on the seaward side into a waiting bathing machine to enter the sea. In 1791 the Quaker physician John Coakley Lettsom established "The Margate Infirmary, for the relief of the Poor whose Diseases require Sea-Bathing" which had its own bathing machine and sea water baths.

During the 19thC, Margate also became place for early ‘tourism’ as pleasure, rather than only as recreation predicated on health: a development aided by the day-trips from London coming down by steamer or train. And in the 20^thC , Margate blossomed as a destination favoured by Londoners, whether for a day or a week. This was the time of cheap fun, arcades and Dreamland. But, as with most similar coastal resorts, that time did not last past the end of the century – Margate declined into desolate, trawdry emptiness.

Walking from The Turner along the front is like walking back into a time-line. Turner Contemporary is the iconic (and seemingly successful) attempt to regenerate Margate, through a new form of tourism and through culture. Built on the site of one of Turner’s ‘lodgings’ (or homes?) in Margate (a town he regularly visited, having lived in it for a while as child); the gallery is often buzzing, albeit mostly with people ‘down from London’. This is newly gentrified Margate – and it spills out a little into the immediate area. Walk further down the seafront and you see something of Margate-in-decline, or struggling: shops, cafes and arcades either semi-open or simply shut. But now the next ‘iconic’ regeneration: Dreamland. Closed and the reinvented as a kind of living museum to seaside fun, especially evoking the heady days of the late 50s and 60s when Margate was so popular. Opened in summer 2015, and still a work in progress, this remains, as a regeneration project, rather controversial. Is it a museum of nostalgia for ‘down from Londoners’ to patronise and laugh at, as much as with? Can it be inclusive enough for locals, or those who simply want to enjoy rather than be subjected to a kind of cultural- educational ‘experience’? What about those prices? However it now develops, there is no question that where Dreamland is, its prominence on the seafront, really needs something ‘done’ with it (trying to make it live, be vibrant), in order to give the seafront any chance at all. The sand are still glorious.. but it has to have some back-up.

Walking further back into history – you arrive at the ‘Royal Seabathing Hospital’. This is the splendid establishment derived from the late 18thC initiative of the Quaker philanthropist and physician John Lettsom. It developed as a charitable foundation, particularly serving the London poor, for both treatment and convalescence. (Karl Marx spent a month here in 1866, following one of his frequent attacks of boils.)

The hospital was transferred in to the NHS, and later became an orthopaedic hospital. After lack of investment or direction for many years, It was finally closed down in 1996. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPNJS03BEDs records the abandoned and derelict hospital in 2004… now it has been ‘redeveloped’ into 272 luxury flats….

Not only was the asset lost (although presumably monies from the sale were recycled in the NHS), but the banality of ‘luxury flats’ missed the opportunity to think more creatively : a hotel and sea water spa? Or, even better, a convalescent home?

Drive out of Margate towards Birchington and turn down in the direction of Birchington-on-Sea. Turn right at Beach, then Avenue, then right into Spenser Road and drive to end (as it turns into Nasmyth Road). Park.

….. England's first bungalow was built in Westgate in 1867. But Birchington may lay claim to having the first bungalow "estate". This was mainly due to the restrictive covenants imposed by Edmund Davis, the autocratic developer of the new "private estate" at Westgate. Consequently only two bungalows were ever built there.

The original builder, John Taylor, then moved along the coast to where John Pollard Seddon, a well-known London architect, had bought land along the cliffs at Birchington at the time of the great railway boom of the 1860s.

The Kentish Gazette of 1870 advertised 240 plots of freehold land for sale by Ventum, Bull and Cooper in the ‘rural simplicity of Birchington’. That year saw two small bungalows built each side of Coleman Stairs, later named ‘Fair Outlook’ and ‘Poets Corner’. In 1872 two more bungalows were built close by, ‘Delmonte’ and ‘White Cliffs’, with ‘Skyross’ added in 1873. These five bungalows were assured of “perfect privacy as there is no private right of way along the cliff”. They were also cut off from each other "by a desert of mud and mire from all chance of Christian intercourse".

By 1880 this estate of bungalows had become fully established, benefiting from the pioneering efforts of a decade earlier. Between 1881 and 1882 four more bungalows were added to the line along the edge of the cliffs, as is shown by the contemporary map.

By now Taylor appears to have relinquished his part in the bungalow development. He died some time between 1879 and 1885. J.P. Seddon then designed what became known as the Tower Bungalow Estate. Among the collection of some 2000 drawings by Seddon in the Victoria and Albert Museum is one sheet titled the "Cliff Estate" showing how he planned to develop and expand the site to incorporate the recently-constructed railway station, renamed Birchington-on-Sea in 1878, with the present Station House also designed by Seddon. The site of the bungalows was some distance from the historic rural village of Birchington around the Parish Church and the development of the surrounding open fields did not come until much later. By 1891 some 13 bungalows had been established making the estate the first in this new form of building design. These bungalows were intended as second homes for "gentlemen of position and leisure", enjoying the class distinctions of Victorian times. In 1881, Athol Mayhew wrote, "Here there are no German bands in the gardens, no distressing minstrels on the sands, no revolting donkey drivers on the roads. Birchington offers absolutely nothing, not even a solitary tea garden." Shorn of these attractions the cheap excursionists from London shunned the spot and travelled on to Margate.

The medical profession advertised that nowhere was to be found a cooler, healthier or more bracing spot by the sea. Sir Erasmus Wilson felt that Birchington air was unequalled anywhere along the whole of Britain's coastline. He calculated that "during a period of twenty-four hours a person would consume twice as much air at Birchington-on-Sea as he would given the same time in London."

The Birchington bungalows were well-built and incorporated novel features such as a lockout tower, a damp-proof course and patent interlocking roof tiles. The whole contents of the larder could be lowered sixty feet into the chalk - an early example of refrigeration.

White Cliffs (see above) was purchased by the artist Solomon Joseph Solomon (1860-1927), who had been visiting the area since his sister, the artist Lily Delissa Joseph, and her husband built a summer home here (designed by Delissa Joseph, an architect - more below). Solomon was a wealthy society artist, much used for portraiture. He became a member of the Royal Academy – still unusual at that time for a Jew (his family practiced their faith and were active members of their Sephardic community in London).

White Cliffs can be found in the tight cluster of Tower Bungalows sited at the end of Spencer Road (note the weird pargetting on the walls of one of them - children at play by the sculptor George Frampton, later made famous by his Peter Pan statue in Kensington Gardens). It is difficult to try and ‘image’ them back to hoe they must have been – although the towers can be traced relatively easily, the verandas have generally been enclosed and windows too often replaced. The fact they turn towards the sea also makes it difficult to appreciate both context and design.

Walk down the little cut (just beyond the bungalows) which takes you down to the beach, and then look up to the concrete building sliding down the cliff.



http://www.28dayslater.co.uk/solomon-joseph-solomons-cliff-top-house-birchington-on-sea-kent-august-2010.t53251

This is actually the edge of gardens of White Cliff, and the remains of Solomon’s studio which his brother-in-law had designed ‘into’ the cliff, as if it hung from the edge, as if on a balcony looking out to the sea. It must have been flooded with light and bathed in the sense of the sea moving below. It could not, however, survive the force of the sea and the crumbling of the cliff…

It is interesting to contrast a painting of Solomon’s of the interior of his Birchington home, with one of his sisters of her home:

Contrasted with one by Lily Delissa Joseph (1863-1940):

Light floods into the room through the windows – the atmosphere is informal, relaxed and suggests a much loved holiday home. Note the picture above the fireplace – women on the march! Lily was a committed suffragist. In 1915, her supportive husband (Delissa Joseph) placed an announcement in the Jewish Chronicle beneath a review of Lily’s 1912 exhibition. “We are requested by Mr Delissa Joseph to state that Mrs. Joseph was unable to receive her friends at the Private View of her pictures, as she was detained at Holloway Gaol, on a charge in connection with the Women’s Suffrage Movement”. Lily drove cars before most women would ever have considered it, and learnt to fly in her 50s.

The tower bungalow which Delissa Joseph designed as his family’s summer home was/is North Sea Lodge on Darwin Road, which was for sale in 2011 at just under £600,000:

North Sea Lodge is situated on a tree lined private road in Birchington-on-Sea, within walking distance of both the seafront and train station. It is believed to have been built by Delissa Joseph in the 1880’s and is an early example of an Indian Lodge. One architectural feature of Indian lodges is a tower with high windows that apparently the owners used to view the tea ships coming in from the Thames.

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-33912422.html

No mention of Lily or of the existence of paintings which depict the house. And that muddled myth of the owners watching their tea ships coming into the Thames… Drive back to Whitstable..