44 Flint Green Road New Door and Original Door Compared

Focus Group members were saddned to notice, that the doors to both 42 and 44 Flint Green Road have been replaced.  The result is a disappointing cheapening and vulgarising of the appearance of the houses.  The original green door, seen on the right  would have been a solid, heavy, Victorian front door, made with high quality Victorian ‘pitch’ pine: dense, slow grown, pine which was used for front doors, ships and other places where a durable wood was required.  It has six panels with proper architrive mouldings around each panel and original brass door furniture.  A door like this would have been made by a craftsman, to fit this house.  It must have had many layers of paint, but it would always have been smoothly painted with no trace of the original wood underneath.

The new door may look superficially ‘smart’ because it is new.  It is also, by comparison with the old door, poorly made – it has no proper architrive.   It is designed so that the grain of the wood shows through, in a, tacky,  fake ‘olde worlde’ pseudo medieval style which would have apalled any Victorian.  The door furniture is clunky, cheap and simply wrong.  The whole item is clearly mass produced and bears no relation to the house.

Front Door, 42 Flint Green Road

There is a simple example of ugliness in the new 42 Flint Green Road door here.  However, there is one sight difference.  We have learned that the original  doors to both buildings went into skips outside the buildings.

On enquiring we were told us that we could check the skips if we liked, and keep any doors that we found.  The door to 42 Flint Green Road was here – half buried in setting cement, but saveable.   Sadly the skip for 44 had recently gone. Workmen, to whom we are very grateful, assisted us in removing the door to 42.  (Thanks also to the prompt response of  Graham of Brum Pushbikes: good work Graham!)  If one of the many people who, we are advised, has expressed an interest in purchasing one of these two properites would like to have an original door back – for either house, then such a door will be available for a while.  It is in good condition.  It will need repainting.  The incongruous  new, plastic, frame, that has been put in will need replacing.  It depends how much you love Victorian houses, but it is all possible.

Front Door to 42 Flint Green Road, in Storage

If you are interested please use the ‘Contact Us’ button near the top of the list of links on the right here.  The door will be kept for a few months, but early contact would be appreciated.  The door was given to us free, and we will not be charging to pass it on: free to anyone who purchases either 42, or 44, Flint Green Road, Acocks  Green.

The pillars and porch canopy over 44 Flint Green Road are, at time of writing this post,  still there.  Now, let us hope very much …

This is yet one more reason why Acocks Green still, urgently, needs a Conservation Area, in order to prevent such destruction.   These are difficult times, but our campaign for a Conservation Area goes on, and we hope to have more discussions, and for residents to be able to undertake some work on this project themselves, soon.

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Further enquries established that the new owners intended to stick to the  plan involving rennovation of the two properties and building some new houses in the large amount of back garden land.   In our campaigning to save these two properties we received some excellent support from the national organisation Save Britian\’s Heritage (See their item on 42-44 Flint Green,  lowerer down in the right hand column on their website here.)   We had an enquiry recently from Save about things are going with the work at 42-44 Flint Green Road.  We expect other people have been wondering too.  Here are  ‘before’ (left) and ‘work in progress’ (right) pictures of 44 Flint Green Road, for comparison.

44 Flint Green Road - Old and New Look, 30.7.2010

This is 44 Flint Green, with the work ongoing.   We are relieved to see the original  door is still in place.  The wooden window frames have been replaced with plastic ones.   Whilst we would have preferred retention of the wooden frames (Victorian pitch pine windows are far more durable than people imagine, and can be insulated.)  we are pleased to see that the design has only been changed slightly, and that the original window shapes and arches in the brickwork are intact.

New Window - 42 Flint Green Road, 30.7.2010

42 Flint Green Road: Work in Progress 30.7.2010

This is a close-up of one of the new windows for  42 Flint Green Road, also being worked on: the new windows for the two houses are identical.

This is 42 Flint Green Road.   Although not visable in the picture, the front door is still there, and intact.  Again, there has been no obvious alteration to external brickwork.  Stone window sills in both properties are now white, rather than the well known E. H. Smith’s green.    We understand that the paintwork of the green sills caused considerable problems because water was trapped underneath the gloss paint, causing stone work to disintegrate.   The interiors have been stripped for work. It seems that the magnificent ‘Minton’ style tiled hall floor in 44 is to stay. We are not sure about other features, but we are presently awaiting the results of enquiries.

Representatives of Concerned Acocks Green Groups Stand outside 44 Flint Green Road

NB if you arrived here from a Google search please go to our most recent posting on this story by going to the top of our website here and scrolling down. A joint local groups meeting of key representatives from concerned Acocks Green groups met on Wednesday 7 October to work out the details of their combined campaign to save these two fine Victorian houses in the heart of Acocks Green.  A local developer has put in a proposal to demolish the houses.  (See previous Flint Green Road posting for more details.)  The campaign has already been active in Arden Road, but has now been more formally launched with six local groups agreeing to support.  They are Arden Road Residents Association, Flint Green Road Residents Association, Acocks Green Focus Group, Acocks Green Neighbourhood Forum, Flint Green House and Birmingham City Mission.   There is a proposal to demolish these two well built and charming Victorian properties in the middle of an area currently proposed as a Conservation Area and to  replace by 11 modern 4  bedroomed houses.  The meeting agreed unanimously that this would be bad for the area on two main counts: it would damage the appearance and character of the area.  It would more dangerous traffic on the road, at a busy junction.    Councillor Roger Harmer, from Acocks Green Ward, also attended the meeting and has agreed to be actively involved.

The meeting was heartened by recent comments on the properties from  Birmingham City Council Conservation Department.  They note that

‘This  scheme is undoubtedly a retrograde step both in terms of the loss of these buildings and the design of the proposed [replacement] dwellings [...

[...] With regard to the design of the new dwellings [...] there is a distinct character (with very few exceptions to the existing properties in Flint Green Road and Arden Road.  The proposed scheme would be extremely incongrous in terms of scale, massing, form and detailed design and would not contribute positively to the street scene. ‘

BCC Conservation are recommending that the application be refused.  However, this is not the end of the story.  The application still has to be formally considered by planning officers and, almost certainly (because it is controversial) by the Planning Committee.  The planning process takes comments from members of the public into consideration.  If you wish to support local residents and the Conservation Department, you may send your own comments to the planning officer concerned, justin.howell@birmingham.gov.uk (Remember Mr Howell is a council officer, he processes the proposals.  He does not make them!)  Alternatively you can write to Planning Managment, 11th Floor, Alpha Tower, Suffolk Street Queensway, Birmingham, B1 1TU. Don’t forget to quote the Planning Application Number, which is 2009/0432/PA

For more details, and our Flikr file of photos, scroll down to see our previous posting on 42-44.

Comments from nearby residents,  would be particularly welcome.