CONTEXT 186 : DECEMBER 2025 51 the early 19th century, were simple structures with a deep tank of water used to provide a seal and a closed vessel rising above the water as the gas volume increased. As demand for gas grew, the technology evolved, with multiple lifts connected in a telescopic manner, counterweights and guide wheels. Most of the large gasholders dating from the 1840s to the 1890s were constructed of cast and wrought iron, with decorative features such as floral motifs, classical mouldings and filigree lattice work. Later they were built of steel. Spiral-guided gasholders came to dominate those built in the 20th century. Highpressure gasholders, another type, were first introduced in the 1930s. Normally they took the shape of a bullet tank with domed ends and, unlike other gasholders, they were static, with no moving parts. After the 1960s the replacement of carbonised coal with imported natural gas caused many of the 19th and 20th century gasworks to be demolished. Although some gasholders continued in use, the more efficient storage of highpressure gas in pipes below ground led to their phased disappearance. This process was carried out by the National Grid, the majority owner of gasholders in the UK, working closely with Historic England to make a detailed record. Gasholders: a history in pictures, using a mixture of archive and contemporary photographs, engineering drawings, paintings, adverts and diagrams, is a valuable outcome. At folio size, with full-page photographs, the book gives a vivid picture of these extraordinary structures, that were largely taken for granted during the years of their operation. Each chapter of the book adopts a different approach, covering the varied types of gasholders, the landscapes they occupied (many are captured in aerial photographs), the engineers who designed them, the people who built and maintained them, and their place in society. There are 3,600 gasworks sites known to have existed in England, and the book includes examples from all parts of the country. The final chapter deals with a possible future for those gasholders that survive. The first to be used in a redevelopment project are those at Kings Cross. They were dismantled in 2001 and re-erected to contain apartments, with the central gasholder becoming an atrium. Similar schemes are proposed for listed gasholders at Bethnall Green, Fulham, Bromley-by-Bow and the famous one at Kennington that overlooks the Oval cricket ground. The National Grid, Historic England and the authors can be congratulated for this useful, if somewhat nostalgic, picture book. Peter de Figueiredo, reviews editor of Context A self-supporting life Hostel, House and Chambers: accommodating the Victorian and Edwardian working woman Emily Gee, Historic England/Liverpool University Press, 2025, 176 pages, hard back, 53 black-and-white and 16 colour illustrations, ISBN 978 1 836244 55 4, £40 You may have walked past the buildings celebrated by this book without knowing their original purpose. Gower Street and nearby Store Street in London are two fine examples, both built to house women who worked at Bourne and Hollingsworth’s store on Oxford Street. Warwickshire House on Gower Street housed 700 women in its two phases (1912 and 1936) and is now student accommodation. The book’s focus is on hostels like these, built for middle-class women in London between the mid-19th century and the second world war. Emily Gee’s study began as an Architectural Association thesis, expanded from previously published papers. Gee, a former head of listing at Historic England, has been director for cathedral and church buildings at the Church of England since 2023. The urban lodging houses built for working-class women are not the subject of the book, but it covers the wider social history background. Gee explains that although wage levels dictated women’s choice of housing options, the campaign to build housing for ‘respectable’ women was partly driven by a desire to protect them from the evils of common lodging houses. Social reformers like Mary Higgs campaigned in a feminist context for housing that enabled a middle-class woman to live ‘a self-supporting life’. As cities grew in the 19th century, thousands of new jobs emerged in shops, offices, libraries, hospitals, schools and colleges, attracting an influx of single women. The book provides some contextual chapters: on the campaign for municipal housing for working women; on men’s lodging houses in London; and on the international context (particularly New York and Boston, USA). It takes us through the development of hostels and housing for middleclass working women. The YWCA (Young Women’s Christian
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