38 CONTEXT 185 : SEPTEMBER 2025 JOE MATHIESON The roofscape of Hampstead Garden Suburb With the distinctive roofs being such an important part of the garden suburb’s historic character, residents, architects and roofers need to understand their detailing. The roofscape of Hampstead Garden Suburb in north-west London is one of its most striking features. On most streets of this conservation area, low sweeping roofs made with pleasingly irregular tiles give a consistency to houses that are otherwise architecturally varied. The former editor of Country Life, Christopher Hussey, spoke evocatively of the ‘luxuriance and variety of roofs… an unending source of interest’ in the neighbourhood. At the Hampstead Garden Suburb Trust, which oversees the area, we have been developing a Roofing Guidance that emphasises their importance while advising residents on their repair and renewal. Begun in 1907, Hampstead Garden Suburb is one of the most significant examples of the early-twentieth-century garden suburb movement. Like the garden cities of Letchworth and Welwyn, it developed under the influence of arts and crafts architects reacting against the architecture of industrialised Britain. The influx of hard, shiny, machine-pressed tiles on the roofs of identical terraced houses across the country was thought to diminish local character and the traditional roofing crafts, and architects like Raymond Unwin, the master planner of the early Hampstead Garden Suburb, wished to rescue both. In his development, traditional handmade, sand-faced clay tiles were almost always used, to evoke the villages of the south of England. His associate Barry Parker spoke of these tiles’ ability to mellow ‘into all sorts of lovely shades’, and this patina of age we enjoy today. The actual form of the suburb roofs designed by Unwin and his office before the first world war can be complex. They are characterised by emphatic sprockets, stone or tile-creased kneelers, upward tilts at the end of the ridge line, open eaves and tiled undercloaks. These details The roofscape of Hampstead Garden Suburb (All photos by Hampstead Garden Suburb Trust)
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