{"id":776,"date":"2018-02-24T15:55:33","date_gmt":"2018-02-24T15:55:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/?p=776"},"modified":"2025-02-25T10:48:42","modified_gmt":"2025-02-25T10:48:42","slug":"the-leaning-chimneys-of-stewartby","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/the-leaning-chimneys-of-stewartby\/","title":{"rendered":"The Leaning Chimneys of Stewartby"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Stewartby,<\/a>Back in the 1930s, the London Brick Company established the largest brickworks in the world across Bedfordshire. \u00a0Over 2,000 people were employed here at this time. A rich source of clay had been found in the place John Bunyan called the \u2018Slough of Despond\u2019 in \u2018The Pilgrim\u2019s Progress\u2019. At the peak of the brickworks, there were as many as 162 chimneys<\/a>, built on the clay soils across Marston Vale<\/a>, linking 8 villages including Stewartby.<\/p>\n

Stewartby itself had 32 chimneys each standing 70 metres tall<\/a>. These chimneys were imposing industrial landmarks on an otherwise rural landscape.<\/p>\n

Peak production was reached in 1936 when some 500 million bricks <\/a>were made. This equates to the bricks required to build 61,154 houses in a year (based on an average 8,176 bricks per house). Later, intensive brick production helped Britain replenish the housing stock following World War II. In this historic context, one wonders how much of England’s housing stock was built with bricks from Marston Vale?<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>
Image credits \u00a9 Brian Kerr \u2018Stewartby Lake 1984\u2019, with kind permission.
Click for full size<\/i><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The amazing productivity of the 1930\u2019s was achieved through introducing a new technology called a dragline. This huge machine excavated large quantities of clay -Oxford Clay- to be delivered on a conveyor belt to the brickworks. Once on site, the clay was moved from a grinding pan through a heated piano wire screen, then pressed into bricks, ready to be fired at 1,000 degrees Celsius in a Hoffmann kiln.<\/p>\n

The bricks\u00a0called\u00a0Flettons\u00a0were produced with\u00a0Oxford\u00a0Clay<\/a>, \u00a0discovered in\u00a0Fletton, Peterborough. This is called ‘the clay that burns’<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0due to a high percentage of organic matter that\u00a0self-ignites when the kiln reaches\u00a0specific temperatures.\u00a0 The clay itself becomes\u00a0fuel! Compared with other clays, this\u00a0unusual property reduced the need for fuel and resources (energy, human, time),\u00a0and therefore\u00a0improved performance efficiencies and economies.<\/p>\n

As part of the process, the chimneys needed to be designed to be as tall as possible to contain and remove hot gas emissions from inside the flue at the fastest rate. The hotter, lighter gases produced an accumulated pressure differential (a draft), which pushed gases up the flue, out the chimney, and across the shire!<\/p>\n

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the brickworks struggled to meet emissions standards (particularly for sulphur oxides) and finally closed in 2008. However, it is notable that the National Brick Development Association aims to address emissions and other environmental concerns with the “2016 Brick Sustainability Report<\/a>“.<\/p>\n

Nonetheless, the brickworks across Marston Vale had been in decline for some years prior to closure. Apparently due to a lower demand for bricks. Ironically this coincided with a decade of increasing shortages in Britain\u2019s housing supply<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Today only 4 chimneys remain standing or perhaps we should say leaning! Once the chimneys cooled, the wetter clay soils caused subsidence. The same clay\u00a0soils used to make the bricks probably undermined the foundations of the chimneys.<\/p>\n

\"Stewartby<\/a>
Image credits \u00a9 Sally Caird \u2018The leaning chimneys of Stewartby’, February, 2018.
Click for full size<\/i><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

So now we have the Leaning Chimneys of Stewartby \u2013 bowing to a bygone age!<\/p>\n

The BBC report<\/a> that demolition has been agreed by the Council on safety grounds. Historic England contested this, seeking to preserve heritage<\/a>. Meanwhile Hanson UK, the owners, want to build 4,000 houses<\/a> on-site once the chimneys are down. Stewartby\u2019s remaining 4 chimneys and 2 kilns a<\/a>re listed for conservation. \u00a0So perhaps it\u2019s not time for farewells?<\/p>\n

One thing we know now, is that any houses built in the vale of the chimneys will not be built by the bricks of Stewartby!<\/p>\n

Sally Caird, 24 February 2018<\/p>\n

Update<\/strong><\/p>\n

Alas, the leaning chimneys of Stewartby are down. 26th September 2021 was the agreed date for demolition.<\/p>\n

Further information<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Find out more\u00a0on brick making<\/a> from the Millennium Clutch project, and from the\u00a0“Changing Landscapes Changing Lives”<\/a> History Archive at the Forest of Marston Vale.<\/p>\n

Brian Kerr (2014) An Unassuming County: The Making of the Bedfordshire Countryside<\/a>. Published in England by EVENTISPRESS.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Back in the 1930s, the London Brick Company established the largest brickworks in the world across Bedfordshire. \u00a0Over 2,000 people were employed here at this time. A rich source of clay had been found in the place John Bunyan called the \u2018Slough of Despond\u2019 in \u2018The Pilgrim\u2019s Progress\u2019. At the peak of the brickworks, there […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":807,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[119,78,85,9,42,81,120,80,83,82,79,84,10],"class_list":["post-776","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-design-comment","tag-bedfordshire","tag-brickworks","tag-built-environment","tag-design-history","tag-energy","tag-environment","tag-housing","tag-industrial-chimneys","tag-london-brick-company","tag-marston-vale","tag-stewartby","tag-stewartby-chimneys","tag-sustainability"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/776","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=776"}],"version-history":[{"count":92,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/776\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5728,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/776\/revisions\/5728"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/807"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=776"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=776"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=776"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}