C O N T E X T 1 2 5 : J U LY 2 0 1 2 21 Rob Sutton The sporting legacy of a garden suburb The Moor Pool estate in Birmingham, inspired by the garden cities and garden suburbs movement, was exceptionally well provided with sporting facilities and open space. The Olympic Games continue to evolve but the 1948 XIV Olympics held in London were the end of an era. These were the final games which, along with the traditional sporting events, hosted art as an integral part of the competition under the International Olympic Committee’s regulations. A Fine Arts Committee was set up comprising distinguished representatives of architecture, sculpture, painting, literature and music. It was in the Applied Arts and Crafts sub-section of Painting and Graphic Art that a resident of Birmingham’s Moor Pool Garden Suburb, the noted silversmith Bernard Cuzner, entered a design for an Olympic torch. The ‘silver symbolic torch’, commissioned by the Goldsmiths Company, achieved an honourable mention. While this may be Moor Pool’s only claim to Olympic glory, from its beginnings in 1907 the estate has provided many opportunities for physical sport, perhaps for its size more so than any other garden suburb. Readers will be aware of those familiar examples such as Hampstead and Brentham, as well as the nearby Bournville Estate. In comparison Moor Pool, otherwise known as the Harborne Tenants Estate, is far less well-known. It was founded by local politician, John Sutton Nettlefold, of the Guest, Keen and Nettlefold industrial conglomerate. Moor Pool, unlike Bournville or Port Sunlight, was never intended as a model industrial village but rather as a blueprint for the expansion of Birmingham. Nettlefold, a Liberal, became the first chairman of the new housing committee in 1901. He first set himself the task of finding a cost-effective solution to Birmingham’s then squalid housing conditions by removing sections of some of the city’s many back-to-back terraced houses to allow more light and air. These became known as ‘Nettlefold courts’. This was a stop-gap solution. To Nettlefold, as a unitarian, the positive values of healthy living held great appeal. He strongly believed that the environment had a profound effect on human behaviour. As he said in his speech to the city council as chairman of the housing committee in 1906: ‘We can, if we will, arrange for healthy, wholesome surroundings for every Birmingham adult and, even more important, give every Birmingham child the light and air that are so essential to its healthy development’. Nettlefold saw at close hand the successes of the Cadburys’ Bournville development, and he was a council member of the Garden Cities and Town Planning Association, following the progress of the garden city movement. Open space was an important part of the garden city and garden suburb concepts, and many included sporting facilities. Moor Pool was a small but well-executed example of a garden suburb, being almost self-contained, with a central complex comprising the community hall and shops. Allotments and open spaces were well represented throughout the estate and the natural feature of the Moor Pool was retained. For its size, Moor Pool was particularly well endowed with sporting facilities. From the very beginning measures were taken to encourage the new residents to partake in healthier activities than the nearby Harborne village might otherwise tempt them with. Although the community hall would not be completed for a further three years, Harborne Tenants quickly provided the Institute meeting rooms by removing some internal walls from a pair of very early semi-detached estate houses as a temporary measure. The Institute had a billiard table, while across the road the Moor Pool The Cuzner silver symbolic Olympic torch (Photo: courtesy of the Goldsmiths Company)
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