Carry on troops!

Parkleys, Ham - Photograph by Tim Crocker

Span Houses were the brainchild of architect Eric Lyons OBE (1912–1980). Built after WWII (almost entirely by Span Developments Ltd.), Lyons aim was to provide affordable well designed family housing situated in a landscaped environment that fostered the idea community living. Together with fellow architect Geoffrey Townsend, and landscape architects Ivor Cunningham and Michael Brown, Eric Lyons created a set of houses that introduced European Modernism to the masses.

Examples of Span House estates include New Ash Green in Kent, Templemere in Surrey and numerous parts of the Cator Estate in Blackheath .

New Ash Green, Kent - Photograph by Tim Crocker

Today these aims and the houses that embody them are just as desirable. They are sustainable, modern, community-spirited, light filled, open plan and are just great looking places to live. Unfortunately, a lot of other design minded individuals think so too so they aren’t as affordable as they were in the 1950s and 1960s!

Last year RIBA had an exhibition that we missed on Span Houses and their creator Eric Lyons. It was just after we bought this place, so we were probably a little distracted at the time. Never mind, a lovely book of the exhibition was produced and on the RIBAPix website there is a whole gallery of wonderful black and white photographs of Span in all their modernist glory. Tim Crocker also has a beautiful gallery of Span photographs in colour. Resident of New Ash Green, Patrick Ellard, and James Strike of Fieldend, Twickenham have both written articles and books on Span from a residents perspective.

If you have a recent Lottery win burning a hole in your pocket I’d suggest looking at The Modern House estate agent site. It has examples of some of the best modernist houses in the UK for sale. I drool. This one in particular in Blackheath really is a gorgeous example of Span housing.

Brooklands Park, Blackheath

Oh, well I’d better push off to buy that Lottery ticket.

Any man who can have this on his website* is OK by me:

“We believe that when it comes to decorating, the wife is always right.
Unless the husband is gay. “

I think I might have to buy his book, ‘My Prescription for Anti-Depressive Living’.

*His online store delivers internationally too, not that I am encouraging you or anything.

We were canny and did neither, we stocked up on DIY supplies before the weekend and set about several projects.

When we weren’t fighting the Great Fox War of 2007 we found time to:

1. Dismantle the hideous railing around our front door, sans angle grinder (the strength of M is now legendary in these parts). The little old lady who owned the flat before us had an ugly concrete ramp and scaffold pole railings constructed around her front door as she must of been a wheelchair user. Or so we assume. The council don’t seem to know who put it there, if permission was given or if it even exists. We have therefore taken the executive decision to get rid. Hopefully we can smash the ugly ramp up soon with a pick-axe and return the entrance of our flat to it’s original state.

2. Filled holes in exterior wall and door left behind by removal of aforementioned railings.

3. Started painting bedroom white. The one large wall we have done so far had so many patches of preparatory filler on it before we could paint (to try to smooth it’s impossibly scarred surface) it looked like it had a pox. Where the previous tenants knife throwers perchance? Next wall needs yet more filling and a good scrub with mould killer. A poorly ventilated room at the best of times the students who lived here before never had the heating on… hence mould on the end wall of the property. Such is the joy of living in a room you are painting, one wall at a time does it while your furniture does the DIY musical chairs dance.

4. Created a garden! Well, not really, just a balcony but it’s green. We bought lavender, two clematis, two cordylines, sage, cherry tomatoes, rosemary, basil, mint (mmm Pimms!) and some cut and come again salad leaf seeds. The balcony is now tastefully green ‘netted’ to the handrail height to prevent foxes and cats getting in (we are obviously on the ground floor) and to provide a medium for the clematis to grow up. More netting is on one wall for the tomatoes to grow along and we’ve put white shelves above that for the potted herbs to sit on. It looks lovely! My cut and come again salads have sprouted on my kitchen window sill and I have even taken some cuttings from one of the bushes in the garden to try and cover a bare patch the other side of our balcony which ‘exposes’ our flat a bit. After one failed attempt (the dreaded wilt) I have had success with the cuttings mark II (plastic bags are your friends, cuttings need high humidity) and I hope for lusty bushes of greenery shortly. My next plan is to propagate some holly.

Latest eBay find found it’s way home last weekend. Not sure why I wanted one but I did and it looks brilliant: a 1932 Imperial Good Companion typewriter. It is magnificent in its machine aesthetic. Minty matte black with yellow keys that you have to really whack to get a good embossed print. No touch typing here! By coincidence I watched a programme recently on BBC Four in their Edwardian season -  ‘Throughly Modern: The Typrewriter’ - on the same subject. At the end of the programme the narrator said young hipsters were now turning their backs on modern technology and could increasingly be found seeking out alternative cafés where they could use traditional manual type to craft letters and works of art. I turned to M and said “Wow, I must be a hipster, I’ve just bought one  of those on eBay.”

Writing essays this week and next so not much posting.

You’ll be pleased to hear my print addiction continues a pace (thank you Etsy) and this weekend we start to paint over the dire ‘urine yellow’ colour walls in the bedroom with fresh clean white eggshell undercoat.

When my projects are done I promise some pictures of the flat, our painting, DIY capers and our hung prints - this site is looking bare!

We are also thinking of hiring - for some traditional bank holiday DIY - an angle grinder. Watch out neighbourhood…

Lesson of the day. Before you rant and rave and spend an eternity on the phone to the service centre, read this, the Washerhelp site.

We had a broken bra strap** and a 20p piece blocking our pump impeller.

*washing machines are the most likely appliance in the home to break.

**bras are the number one enemy of washing machines - get a small net laundry bag to put them in before placing them in the wash.

The lounge is coming on a pace with three quarters of the walls now painted in their undercoat of matt white. Tonight we should be able to put the furniture back in and just have the area around the fireplace to do. We can’t really tackle any of the woodwork in any of the rooms yet until we get the very badly put in central heating system removed. We have pipes upon pipes! Most of them blocking access to all the skirting boards and just looking a godamn mess…

I’ll take some after pictures when the lounge is painted… hopefully we’ll see a difference from green woodchip wallpaper!

Last night our latest eBay acquisition came - a narrow 1960s Danish midcentury modern chest of drawers for the hall. It’s lovely, and again has turned legs that match the dining table and the sideboard. I still can’t get over how much of a resource eBay is. It wasn’t the cheapest chest ever but it is exactly what we wanted… I could of searched a hundred car boot sales before finding something as lovely.

My plan for the hall is to have the chest sit below a large G-Plan-esque wood framed mirror (round, irregular, rectangular shaped - who knows!) and have my handturned walnut bowl I bought from Venice on top. The bowl will serve as a repository for M’s pockets when he gets home from work and wants to put his keys, mobile and wallet somewhere. The top will also hold a small cheery vase and a place for post. The mirror will serve two functions: to open up our dark hall and aid last minute hair checking before venturing out. See, I got it all planned. The chest itself will soon be filled with accessories like gloves, scarves, small umbrellas, hats, ballet pumps shoes and all those little outer wear items that never seem to have a home.

We also framed two recent art purchases. One is a poster that everyone and his dog seems to have but I just adore, in fact the text is fast becoming our motto when we get stressed about the house: “Keep Calm and Carry On”. This is going in the hall in it’s trim white IKEA ribba frame. That way we can see it when we walk though the door and remind ourselves that it could be worse

Well, I have bought a few things for me and the flat recently and wanted to recommend the lovely sellers who’ve brightened my day and my home.

The Black Apple

Every Jot and Tittle

Florspace

Tinymeat

Modern Art Everyday

Creative Thursday

Absoluut

Melissa Moss

Support artists, shop Etsy.

Updated 27 April to add:

One Good Bumblebee

Magic Jelly

Tummy Ache

Art and Ghosts - a photoartist friend of mine who is criminally talented

Sugarloop

Living Etc. is good this month as it is ‘The White Issue’ - do I ever love white. Apparently different shades and textures of white are OK in your home, wall to wall brilliant white is not. I’ve always loved white homes, however impractical they might seem. In fact they are highly practical, you can see all the dirt and one can easily keep a can of white paint handy for occasional touch ups. We are doing our entire place in Dulux Trade matt white eggshell at the moment to get rid of our crazy inherited colour scheme. We look at this purely as ‘undercoat’. When we can finally decorate - in October now, gah - our walls will be perfectly prepared. I’m looking at ‘Swedish White‘ (Dulux Heritage range) and ‘Cornforth White‘ (Farrow and Ball) for our lounge, both soft grey whites. In the hall - as it is tiny - we plan on ‘Ultimate White’ from the Dulux Light and Space range, a super reflective white designed to increase the feeling of space. The lounge will also have two feature walls in vintage 60s/70s wallpaper.

Would you believe it, Elle Decoration has a lounge special this month; wall to wall sofas! Great timing ED. Well, as I have neither £2000 or a 3 metre long space I am safe from their temptations but some of the smaller ones from Dwell and Habitat are good. Talking of sofas I am still drawn to vintage ones from eBay etc (look under Antiques>Sofas>20th Century). Some sellers even do delivery, *sigh* However, I am sure M is not as keen as I am on a Danish / Eames /Hansen delight. I am sure it would look awesome in the lounge but I guess M is thinking “Would it sag / smell / have fleas?” Vintage furniture lovers had a treat this week on ‘Grand Designs‘ with all the 1930s stuff the featured couple bought. Buying old and reupholstering / refinishing is the smart way to go kids*.

Real Simple has great tips as usual. I now know I can use baby oil to clean my stainless steel taps and cook the perfect dish containing leeks.

*That said I’m now looking at importing my perfect sofa from America, whoops. Watch this space for the continuing sofa saga.

The scheduled date is September, just when my new academic year starts… thanks a lot.

As we were lied to by our vendor and freeholder as to these works I am going to fight like hell on the choice of removal company, storage facility and hotel.

I’m angry and upset and I feel my house dreams - temporarily - have been ruined.