A space age-like leisure centre which inspired Liam Gallagher to name his band Oasis, instead of The Rain, has been placed on a top 10 list of 20th century British buildings most at risk.
Oasis leisure centre in Swindon is on a list published every two years by the Twentieth Century Society, highlighting threats to more recent architectural heritage. Top of the list is Coventry’s Bull Yard shopping precinct while other buildings include London’s City Hall and Swansea civic centre.
The leisure centre occupies an interesting – if not very rock’n’roll – place in British pop history in that Liam Gallagher thought it a better name for a band he had just joined. It seems to be as simple as him liking the name after seeing it listed as a venue on an Inspiral Carpets tour poster in the bedroom he shared with his brother Noel.
Noel, a roadie for Inspiral Carpets, soon joined the band and it was Oasis, not The Rain, which became one of the biggest bands in British music history.
The leisure centre is also “of national architectural significance,” said the society. Described as a “fantasy structure” Oasis has pools, waterslides and a 45m “flying saucer” transparent dome. The society described it as a “rare and important survivor” of municipal leisure centres created for fun and families rather than training and competition.
It was announced last year that the centre would not reopen after the pandemic with plans for it to be part of a £270m redevelopment which include a ski centre. That would involve some demolition which the society opposes. It has moved to protect the building with a listing application.
The Bull Yard shopping precinct in Coventry is top of the society’s list because of a proposed 15-acre city centre redevelopment plan. The council argues it is attempting to make Coventry fit for the 21st century but campaigners are calling for repair, not demolition.
Coventry is this year’s UK city of culture presenting, said Caroline Croft, director of the Twentieth Century Society, “a brilliant opportunity for the council to showcase its post-war buildings but sadly it has largely ignored our concerns as it continues to show an appalling disregard to its duty to properly protect the city’s important post-war architectural heritage”.
London City Hall, the distinctive Norman Foster-designed glass building which opened near Tower Bridge in 2002, is at risk, say campaigners, because the mayor, Sadiq Khan, is relocating the Greater London Authority to a new home in the Royal Docks in Newham.
Swansea civic centre, an imposing brutalist-style building constructed in two phases between 1979 and 1984, has been earmarked for demolition as part of a city centre and waterfront regeneration plan.
The society said only one 20th century Welsh county hall is listed, the Shire Hall in Newport built in 1902, “compared to multiple listed 19th-century examples. The C20 Society is strongly opposed to demolition and has submitted an application to have the building listed at Grade II.”
Other buildings in the top 10 are The Lawns halls of residence at the university of Hull; the former headquarters of the London Electricity Board in Bethnal Green; the Cressingham Gardens housing estate in Tulse Hill, south London; Derby Assembly Halls; Shropshire council’s modernist HQ, Shirehall, in Shrewsbury; and Halifax swimming pool and its ceramic murals depicting British pond life.
The society said there was little good news from the 10 cases on the last list in 2019. Two buildings have been demolished and there are, as yet, no positive outcomes for the others.
