(image: Capel Manor House ©James Davies English Heritage)
Four modern buildings have been added to the National Heritage List for England
A cold war bunker in Gravesend, a high tech' warehouse in Swindon, a concrete electricity sub station in Sheffield and a steel-framed private house in Horsmonden, Kent have become listed buildings because of their architectural importance in the modern era.
A Roman Catholic Church in Birkenhead has also been upgraded to Grade II status.
The buildings are the most recent post-war buildings to the National Heritage List for England, supplementing the nearly 700 which have been added since post-war listing started 25 years ago.
The new listings coincide with the opening of Brutal and Beautiful, a new English Heritage exhibition looking at the nation's love/hate relationship with our recent architectural past, and contributing to the passionate debate over what is worth saving?
Gravesend Civil Defence Bunker has been listed at Grade II as a rare surviving example of a purpose-built civil defence control centre. It was a command post in the event of a Soviet air attack during the Cold War and is evocative of a time when the threat of nuclear destruction was a real threat.
The bunker would have been staffed by around 35 people, where information from air raid wardens of an attack would have been received and orders issued to civil defence and emergency services. It was operational from 1954 until 1968, has now been restored and is open to the public on occasions throughout the year.
(image: Roof of the Spectrum Building © James Davies English Heritage)
Designed by Sir Norman Foster, one of the most prominent contemporary architects in Britain, the Spectrum Building (formerly the Renault Distribution Centre) in Swindon has been listed at Grade II.
The Spectrum Building was built in 1980 to designs drawn up by Foster Associates for the French vehicle manufacturing company. Foster was highly influential in the early development of this kind of high tech architecture and the bold and distinctive building features yellow steel umbrella masts and a yellow roof around the single-storey glass-walled warehouse. The building provided a futuristic backdrop to scenes in the 1984 James Bond film, 'A View to a Kill'.
A concrete electricity substation on Moore Street in Sheffield has been given Grade II listing.
The sub-station, designed by Bryan Jefferson, formed an important component of the radical post-war regeneration of Sheffield, helping to revitalise the city after it was bombed by the Germans in World War Two.
Michael Manser was one of the small number of architects in the 1960s and 1970s who first explored the possibilities of steel-frame construction for domestic architecture, a type of house that the famous architect, Mies van der Rohe pioneered.
Capel Manor House is the house he designed in Horsmonden, Kent. The steel frame is exposed and the glass walls are bronze-tinted with a flat timber roof; its high position dominates landscape. Capel Manor House joins just 5.5% of listed buildings in the UK.
The Roman Catholic Church of English Martyrs in Wallasey, Birkenhead was built in 1952.
Designed by the notable 20th century ecclesiastical architect, Francis Xavier Velarde who had a highly distinctive style and this building is a fine example of his carefully detailed and boldly modelled churches combining Modernist and Romanesque influences. The church has an unusual font designed by sculptor Herbert Tyson Smith.
Ed Vaizey, Heritage Minister said: "Everyone knows that England has a fine and wonderful built heritage. But it's sometimes forgotten that we have many outstanding modern buildings too. Our architects are among the best in the world and it's absolutely right that their finest work is afforded the same protection as their historic forebears."
About post-war listing
- The first post-war building to be listed was Bracken House, former home of the Financial Times in the City of London in 1987.
- A building has to be to 30 years old to be considered for listing unless it is under threat and of exceptional interest - in which case it has to be over 10 years old.
- There are around half a million listed buildings in England, included within more than 375,000 entries on the National Heritage List for England. The total number of post-war listed buildings is calculated to be 0.18% of the total at 690.
Brutal and Beautiful: Saving the Twentieth Century takes place 25 September - 24 November 2013: Open Wednesday to Sunday, 10am to 5pm, Wellington Arch, London, W1J 7JZ.
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