39 - 79 Raby Street, Byker Wall

Long terrace of houses and flats. 1978-9 by Ralph Erskine's Arkitektkontor; site architect Vernon Gracie; structural engineer, White, Young and Partners; main contractor, Shepherd Construction. Pale brick metric modular brick construction on timber frame, partly clad in weatherboarding, low-pitched metal roofs on plywood box beam purlins. Flats set over open ground floors (so-called stilt blocks) of concrete blockwork construction on in situ ground-floor concrete frame, clad in metric modular brickwork and brown weatherboarding, blue metal roofs.

Two and three storeys. Nos. 39-47 Raby street of three storeys with blue balconies, blue weatherboarding to first floor, white weatherboarding above second-floor strip windows. Very prominent projecting integral bin stores and sheds joined to house by timber catslide roofs of blue timber with battening. Rear has green windows and green weatherboarding. Nos. 49-53 are stilt block flats, entered off gallery reached via stairs to left, with brown balconies. Nos. 53-65 and nos. 73-9 repeat the distinctive format of nos. 39-47 Raby Street, while nos. 67-71 repeat nos. 49-53. Timber windows in timber surrounds with aluminium opening lights, mainly sliding; timber doors with glazed panel, some renewed in hardwood.

The Byker area, first extensively developed in the 1890s, was earmarked for redevelopment from the late 1950s, with a new motorway to the north. In March 1967 the Housing Architect's Department proposed the building of a barrier block to shelter the area, and this idea was supported by Ralph Erskine, who was invited to develop the area for Newcastle Corporation in 1969. His Plan of Intent, published in 1970, promised a complete redevelopment programme of housing and landscaping with cost yardsticks, while maintaining the traditions and character of the neighbourhood, and to rehouse the residents without breaking family and social ties. His achievement in rehousing 40% of the original residents on the original site was exceptional, as were his methods of keeping the community informed of development and seeking their support and suggestions for the low-rise housing. In achieving these goals Erskine sought to exploit the south-facing sloping site, to develop a system of pedestrian routes through the estate and to provide a `specific "local" individuality to each group of houses.' The estate was redeveloped in a rolling programme of no more than 250 units at a time, to try to maintain the community's infrastructure. The idea was a sheltering perimeter block, which protects the estate from traffic noise and creates a micro climate, with low-rise housing in its lee. The modular metric facing brick of 290mm x 90mm x 65mm was developed by Crossley and Sons in County Durham, in collaboration with the City of Newcastle. When mortared, it forms a 12" by 4" by 3" unit. The inventiveness of the decoration, developed following the relatively muted `pilot scheme' at Janet Square, marks Byker out from other post-war housing for bringing the humane concepts of `romantic pragmatism' with its neo-vernacular details and materials to public housing in a unique way. It is probably also the greatest achievement of this important and idiosyncratic international architect. `If there is something marvellously lighthearted about the design, this I would say is the topographical keynote of the new Byker' (Architectural Design, June 1975, p.333).

Sources
Tyne and Wear Archives
Architectural Review, December 1974, pp.346-62
Mats Egelius, Ralph Erskine, Architect, Stockholm 1990, pp.148-60 LISTED GRADE 2*