New Developments - Trust Annual Report 1966
If you stand with your back to Sherriff & Ward's in the High Street and look northwards along Middle Brook Street, you are confronted with what must be Winchester's worst view. This is at the heart of commercial Winchester near the largest car park, and seen by every shopper coming into the town. This is an example of the worst kind of urban redevelopment.
The main elements of the scene are branches of two of the largest and wealthiest multiples in the country, one on your left and the other to the right. The proprietors of the latter are known to be patrons of the arts, yet the building is one of the most commonplace imaginable.
In the middle distance is the new Post Office, surely one of the most undistinguished recent buildings in Winchester. Completely characterless, it could appear in the High Street of any ordinary town throughout the length and breadth of the land. Anything so dull should not find a place here.
As you survey the scene, the centre is occupied by the clumsy mass of the Bingo Hall. Admittedly never intended to be seen in this detached way, it is revealed in all its stark unattractiveness. This was not an attractive area, but clearance and rebuilding presented a wonderful opportunity. How is it that there was no insistence on something better for Winchester?
The City Council themselves have set a fine example in the Casson block, facing the new Post Office. At the far end of Middle Brook Street in Park Avenue, at the river's edge, the County Council have also set a splendid example in the new School of Art.
The resources and wealth of the country have never been greater than they are today, yet never have general standards of building been so abysmal. To say that we cannot afford good building is nonsense. It is essential that we do afford good building. This is about people and the way they live. If one fraction of the effort required to get rockets on the moon or on defence were devoted to design for living, our cities could be places worth living in.
Creating an environment whose only virtue is reasonable hygiene is inexcusable. Our ancestors' buildings had humanity even if they lacked first rate sanitation.
The picture is mercifully not all dark. As well as the two new buildings of the Local Authorities, there are two splendid restorations. Winchester is greatly indebted to two outside interests, the National Provincial Bank and Northampton Town & County Building Society. The former has retained and restored their facade on the original site, while the latter has restored one of the most important buildings at the Butter Cross.
This is enlightened Preservation, essential to the City, and it is good news that Messrs. Boots are restoring the frontage of neighbouring premises recently acquired. In this way the work of preservation in Winchester is proceeding well.
At present we must express most concern about the design of new buildings other than those of the Local Authorities. William Deacons Bank which, with the Casson Block this year received a Civic Trust Award, is the example which most readily comes to mind as a good building for modern Winchester. It is to be hoped that the Corporation will press on with the development of the Brooks area. Most of this now presents a very desolate aspect. Here is a wonderful opportunity to create a new and attractive part of the city. It must not be lost.