SOUTHGATE; Transformation by Tube
Old Southgate is only seven miles from the City, but as recently as the 1920s it still had the character of a country village. Southgate was not directly affected by the Victorian railway lines from London which by-passed it on both sides. These only encouraged limited suburban development close to the stations at New Southgate, Palmers Green and Winchmore Hill. Old Southgate’s rural isolation ended dramatically with the arrival of the Piccadilly line in 1932-3. The Tube provided convenient and direct access to central London and led to the transformation of the whole area into a commuter suburb in less than a decade.
The original Piccadilly Tube was opened between Hammersmith and Finsbury Park in 1906. In 1929 the Underground announced plans to extend the line at both ends. The northern extension was in tunnel below the built up area of Wood Green, surfacing into green fields north of Bounds Green. A short tunnel took it under Southgate village, the only settlement on the route through to the terminus at rural Cockfosters.
The eight new stations on the Southgate extension were designed by Charles Holden in a modern style that was radically different to the existing Victorian suburban stations in north London. Frank Pick, the Underground’s design conscious Managing Director, wanted every aspect of the new electric railway to be efficient and functional, reflecting the progressive values of his organisation. The guiding principle was always ‘fitness for purpose’ with the layout and design of stations following practical considerations such as passenger flow and the need to fit into the surrounding environment at street level and yet be easily identifiable from a distance.
Pick and Holden went on an architectural study tour of northern Europe in 1930 and the Piccadilly line extension stations show strong influences of the modern Dutch, German and Swedish design they found there. Holden’s Underground stations all have features in common but no two are identical. Arnos Grove, basically a drum on a cube, is clearly inspired by the shape of the Stockholm Public Library, designed by Gunnar Asplund in the 1920. Southgate is lower and sleeker, like a futuristic flying saucer but more directly influenced by the latest metro station designs of Berlin and Hamburg. It includes a carefully integrated bus station and curved shopping parade. The Piccadilly line stations must have seemed like alien intruders when they were built, but they are all now listed buildings and recognised as some of the best early twentieth century architecture in London.
The dramatic new Underground stations had very little stylistic influence on the suburban development that quickly grew up around them. Most of the new private housing estates that rapidly covered the fields at Arnos Grove, Osidge, Oakwood and Cockfosters offered conventional semi-detached homes for sale, many of them with ‘Tudorbethan’ decorative features such as wooden beams and leaded windows. Giant versions of this style were often used for new pubs in the 1930s and the Harvester on Bowes Road built a few years after Arnos Grove station nearby could not be a greater contrast to Holden’s Tube design. Conversely, the library and swimming pool just down the road, built in 1938, follow the Scandinavian modern style of the new station. Only a handful of the houses and flats built in Southgate were ‘moderne’ designs with flat roofs and curved metal framed windows. This more daring period style was apparently acceptable for public buildings, cinemas and schools but was not popular among domestic house buyers.
Suburban Southgate, created entirely in the decade before the outbreak of war suddenly ended London’s continuing spread, remains a fascinating mixture of the different tastes of a period now only just within living memory. Next time you take the Tube up to town, just think about what a huge impact its arrival had on your district less than eighty years ago and take a moment to appreciate the stunning design of your local stations.
OG
20.11.2009
Images from the London Transport Museum