Hatfield

[Coast]

At 4.00 am on this day in 1957 a resident of a new housing development at Hatfield in Hertfordshire is woken by a gale. It seems to him, half asleep as he is, that his ceiling is moving. Suddenly with a roar, in a shower of dust, the roof peels away and the resident is peering at the stars. A moment later with a blinding flash his neighbour’s roof goes too tearing out the electrical wiring.

In the next few minutes’ twenty-four more of the shallow pitched roofs – acting in the wind like aeroplane wings, are sucked upwards for takeoff. Next morning buckled aluminium sheets from fifty houses litter the gardens.

Demand for new, low cost housing after the Second World War fuelled by the baby boom, prompts a house building revolution, and a break with architectural tradition. Gone in the scramble to build, are vernacular styles and materials adapted over centuries to combat regional quirks of wind, damp or driving rain - traditions such as steep-pitched roofs, small windows, lime mortar, heavy slates or tiles and careful sitting with regard to aspect and shelter In come cheaper materials and quicker if unproven techniques. The consequence is Hatfield.

From The Wrong Kind Of Snow - Woodward and Penn

From 1947 to 1959 Lionel Brett, The 4th Viscount Esher had been the consultant architect and planner for Hatfield New Town, where he was responsible for three shopping centres, a church and several housing projects. He sought higher densities and, in order to overcome shortages of brick and timber, used an inexpensive concrete system drawn up by the contractor to Esher's designs of houses with curved walls and aluminium sheet roofs.

More than 380 houses were built in this fashion, and they seemed to be a success until a storm in 1957 blew the roofs off 50 of them. While it was not the architects' fault and there were no injuries, Esher's practice suffered considerably. He later recalled: "Silly ladies meeting me for the first time still lead off with 'Oh yes, weren't you once in trouble about roofs blowing off?' It is the only thing widely known about my architectural career."

www.telegraph.co.uk/obituaries

[osmposm]

Not quite sure why it was "not the architects' fault". If the roofs were built using what turned out to be a (regionally) highly unsuitable technique, following design specs provided by him, it's difficult to know exactly who else to blame!?

I suppose he'd say he did the best he could given the post-war materials situation.....but it doesn't exactly surprise me that his practice suffered as a result. Sounds like one of those typical post-war planners who knew what was best for everyone else to live in, while continuing to live in rather more traditional houses themselves.....I see from the obituary that he lived much of his life in "Watlington Park, near Henley, which he restored to its Georgian proportions." And also that when he designed a modernist extension to his aunt's old cottage, she was so horrified at the built reality that she sacked him as architect, and got the builder to put a proper roof on!