Otto Saumarez Smith

Spode Coventry Cathedral commemorative plate, designed by Harold Holdway, 1972. Referencing the Angel of Agony mosaic mural in the Chapel of Gethsemane by Stephen Sykes.

Part 2 –  Brutalism and the Transformed City Part 2 –  Brutalism and the Transformed City Image Credits: Architectural Press Archive / RIBA Collections 26February2026Part 2 – Brutalism and the Transformed CitySpeaker: Dr. Otto Saum…

I'm giving a webinar lecture for the British Architectural Library Trust on 'Brutalism and the Transformed City' tomorrow. Details here: thebaltrust.org/part-2-bruta...

Images © Reach Plc / Ruth Millington

Images © Stuart Lamb / Arts in Redditch

Images © Stuart Lamb / Arts in Redditch

NEWS: C20 has supported listing Eduardo Paolozzi's polychromatic Pop Art murals (1983) at Kingfisher Shopping Centre in Redditch, described as the 'Ravenna of the New Towns' by historian Owen Hatherley. The 12 mosaic panels depict the towns industrial heritage.

➡️ c20society.org.uk/news/support...

Hooray!

This two-day workshop will explore several questions. How can environmental history complement or offer alternatives to existing historiographical narratives and periodisations in British history? What new actors, events, or phenomena might come to the fore? How should it foster engagements with places beyond its national borders or with other disciplines? Is environmental history different from longstanding traditions of ‘landscape’ or ‘urban’ histories of Britain? What contributions can historians make to environmental advocacy and policymaking? And how might a focus on the environment reshape teaching in British history? To take part, participants should submit a 300 word proposal for a short ‘position paper’ (approx. 2500 words) that will be pre-circulated at the workshop. These position papers will address the place of environmental approaches and themes within modern British history (1800 to the present) from the perspective of the participant’s own research. Participants will orally summarise their papers at the workshop. The event is free to attend and includes lunch and refreshments. Submissions are welcomed across a range of perspectives and topics, including but not limited to: energy, extraction, non-human actors, pollution, toxicity, rural and urban landscapes, everyday environmental histories (including how they are shaped by class, gender, and race), imperialism and decolonisation, ‘green’ policy, activism, and the political economy of the natural world. Please send proposals and a one-paragraph biography in a single PDF to andrew.seaton@manchester.ac.uk by 15 May 2026. Please also direct enquiries to this address. This event is organised by Dr. Max Long (Oxford) and Dr. Andrew Seaton (Manchester).

CALL FOR PAPERS - Modern British History and the 'Environmental Turn'.

A two-day workshop organised by @maxlong.bsky.social and myself at Lincoln College, Oxford, 16-17 September. Deadline for abstracts is 15 May.

Details in poster below, please share.

Grimsby Central Library - John Michael Milner (1966-68) Image © Chris Matthews

Grimsby Central Library - John Michael Milner (1966-68) Image © Chris Matthews

Grimsby Central Library - John Michael Milner (1966-68) Image © Modern Mooch

NEWS: C20 has written to Historic England requesting an urgent spot listing assessment for Grimsby Central Library (1966-68), after concerns that the 'civic masterpiece' is facing an imminent threat of being stripped-out, having been closed since March 2025.

➡️ c20society.org.uk/news/concern...

The cover of History Workshop Journal 100. The cover is a woodland green, and shows an abstract illustration of a coniferous tree based on Sadiah Qureshi's article on the Wollemi pine.

The latest issue of History Workshop Journal is out now, and it marks two exciting milestones: 50 years and 100 issues of innovative radical history.

You can read the journal on the HWJ website through the link below!

academic.oup.com/hwj...

Super. Much looking forward to reading this...

Glorious! Tell me about the cover photograph please

An Injury To All: The Unmaking of the British Working Class will be published by Verso in October!

Today I submitted responses to last comments from my editor and worked on the blurb. It's getting closer and closer!

YouTube video by Cambridge University Press Krista Cowman interviews with editors of The Modern British City 1945-2000

Interview for @urbanhistory.bsky.social of Simon Gunn, @petermandler.bsky.social, & I about the recently published book The Modern British City.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wvE....

❤️

This is such a great piece.

‘All the Kids Wanna Sniff Some Glue’: glue-sniffing, deindustrialization, and moral panic in 1980s Britain Abstract. This article analyses anxieties surrounding glue-sniffing in 1980s Britain and their entanglement with the era’s accelerated deindustrialization.

Brilliant new article by @malcolmrussell73.bsky.social on glue-sniffing panics, youth boredom and deindustrialising towns c. 1970s-80s, published in @mbhjournal.bsky.social

This began life as an exceptional MA dissertation at @uclhistory.bsky.social

Congrats Malcolm!

doi.org/10.1093/tcbh...

For anyone interested in geocoding historical census records, my new article in @socscihistory.bsky.social's journal explains how I've used ordnance surveys and trade directories to link British Victorian records! doi.org/10.1017/ssh....

The James Ford Lectures in British History The Language of Social Science in Everyday Life - Peter Mandler (Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge)

Looking for an intellectual treat? @petermandler.bsky.social 's Ford Lectures on 'The Language of Social Science in Everyday Life' begin Thursday 22 January and continue weekly through 26 February in Oxford. #Skystorians

Staffordshire Pearlware child’s mug with sign language decoration, c.1820

Cover of book titled The Modern British City 1945-2000 Edited by Simon Gunn, Peter Mandler and Otto Saumarez Smith. Dark green background with photo of two red brick Victorian terraced houses in front of a medium rise block of concrete modernist flats with three children and a dog in front of the houses.

Boxing Day morning coffee and new books. This edited by Simon Gunn @petermandler.bsky.social @osaumarezsmith.bsky.social is a real treat. Highly recommend.

Lovely Christmas present left on my doorstep today - it really is as amazing as I’d hoped -all 29 chapters. The illustrations look fantastic - big thanks to Lund Humphries and the editors. Never seen an academic book looking happier on a coffee table 🙂

Thank you Dave. Hope you enjoyed my first short stab at Stoke, which you were helpful with. I'm planning a trip in the new year, and would be good to catch up.

#Booksof2025

8. The Modern British City 1945-2000 - Simon Gunn, Peter Mandler & Otto Saumarez Smith

An epic account of the rise and fall of British Modernism

www.lundhumphries.com/products/the...

Characteristically brilliant piece.

It's an account of meeting Bentley, in the diaries, but also reused fictionally in the Roll Call.

I'm *so* pleased! Isn't it good? Do you know Arnold Bennet's extraordinary description of Westminster going up.

grey cover of Bricks and Mortar reprint with colourful bookmark

2 pages from the book about Westminster Cathedral (Bentley)

Side view of Bentley's Westminster Cathedral from the side, red brick and white stripes against bright blue sky, camapanile furthest from camera

Thanks to @osaumarezsmith.bsky.social for recommending Helen Ashton's novel Bricks and Mortar, 1932, republished by Persephone. One of the few novels about architects, written with sympathetic understanding of the profession and the ambitions of two overlapping generations in British architecture /

The following letter was sent to the Master of the college by an English teacher in 1981:

All bangers. Such a great city for Modern churches. The best?

Madonna dei Poveri is incredibly moving.

Barbican revamp to give ‘bewildering’ arts centre a new lease of life Project will make the famously confusing London landmark easier to navigate and more accessible

Piece on the revamp of the Barbican (www.theguardian.com/culture/2025...) displays a depressing negativity from the project team, nobody appears to want to work with the grain of these thrilling spaces, & accessibility issues are grossly exaggerated: I know it’s a brilliant place for a wheelchair.

Slightly surreal for the Modern British City to be co-reviewed in the Literary Review alongside @holsmith.bsky.social's wonderful Up in the Air, on the page after my father's new book on Vanbrugh. Three excellent books I think, & Jerry White concludes of MBC that 'Its richness is truly staggering'.