In this picturesque exploration of Britain’s constructed landscape, an array of medieval lanes, Georgian crescents and Victorian squares make an appearance, together with the people – famous, infamous and unfamiliar – who designed, built and lived in them. From Bedford Square and Portobello Road in London, through to Grey Street in Newcastle and Charlotte Square in Edinburgh, Historic Streets and Squares takes you over the doorstep of some of the country’s most familiar addresses. Melanie Backe-Hansen takes us beyond the facades, delving into the evolution of ancient streets, the aspirations of builders and architects, and the extraordinary lives of past residents. She also reveals the fascinating stories of how some of our oldest and most valued crescents, lanes and avenues have survived into the twenty-first century, and the twists and turns of their journey along the way. Taken together, these fifty examples tell us much about Britain’s urban development over the centuries, while also highlighting more recent attempts to preserve our architectural heritage. The history of our streets, avenues, lanes and squares reveals more than just changes to architectural style, but offers a doorway into the heritage of our nation.

Although rarely explored in academic literature, most inhabitants and visitors interact with an urban landscape on a day-to-day basis is on the street level. Storefronts, first floor apartments, and sidewalks are the most immediate and common experience of a city. These "plinths" are the ground floors that negotiate between inside and outside, the public and private spheres. The City at Eye Level qualitatively evaluates plinths by exploring specific examples from all over the world. Over twenty-five experts investigate the design, land use, and road and foot traffic in rigorously researched essays, case studies, and interviews. These pieces are supplemented by over two hundred beautiful color images and engage not only with issues in design, but also the concerns of urban communities. The editors have put together a comprehensive guide for anyone concerned with improving or building plinths, including planners, building owners, property and shop managers, designers, and architects.

Forty outstanding urban spaces of the Western world, analyzed and drawn at a common scale for easy comparison.

The early modern period is often characterised as a time that witnessed the rise of a new and powerful merchant class across Europe. From Italy and Spain in the south, to the Low Countries and England in the north, men of business and trade came to play an increasingly pivotal role in the culture, politics and economies of western Europe. This book takes a comparative approach to the effect such merchants and traders had on the urban history of market places - streets, squares and civic buildings - in some of the great commercial European cities between the fifteenth and seventeenth centuries. It looks at how this in period, the transformations of designated commercial areas were important enough to modify relationships throughout the entire urban context. Market places tend to be very ancient, continuing to function for centuries on the same location; but between the middle of the fourteenth and the first decades of the seventeenth, their structures began to change as new regulations and patterns of manufacture, distribution and consumption began to install a new uniformity and geometry on the market place. During the period covered by this study, most major European cities undertook the rebuilding of entire zones, constructing new buildings, demolishing existing structures and embellishing others. This book analyses the intentions of innovation, in parallel with sanitary and hygienic reasons, the juridical regulations of the architecture of certain building types and the urban strategies as efficient tools to better control the economic activities within the city.

This book is concerned with the remarkable changes made to the built environment in Lancashire’s main textile district – essentially the eastern and central parts of the county – during the Industrial Revolution (c1780-c1850). A case-study approach is taken, with findings from investigations at six different types of site being presented. The sites included are water-powered mill remains in the Cheesden Valley, near Rochdale; Barrow Bridge factory village, near Bolton; the former handloom weavers’ colony at Club Houses, Horwich; Preston’s Winckley Square; Eanam Wharf at Blackburn; and, to the north of Bolton, the road between Bromley Cross and Edgworth. The case studies show how, in rural and urban areas alike, developments in industry, housing and transport greatly extended the built environment and brought striking new features to it. Emphasis is placed on interpreting the physical evidence the sites provide, linking it with that taken from various types of documentary source, especially historical maps. By making comparisons with developments occurring at similar types of site elsewhere in Britain, as well as in Europe and North America, the forms the changes took are explained and their significance assessed. Additionally, insights are provided into the economic and social impact the changes brought, especially on the everyday lives that people led.

How a German city became Polish after World War II With the stroke of a pen at the Potsdam Conference following the Allied victory in 1945, Breslau, the largest German city east of Berlin, became the Polish city of Wroclaw. Its more than six hundred thousand inhabitants—almost all of them ethnic Germans—were expelled and replaced by Polish settlers from all parts of prewar Poland. Uprooted examines the long-term psychological and cultural consequences of forced migration in twentieth-century Europe through the experiences of Wroclaw's Polish inhabitants. In this pioneering work, Gregor Thum tells the story of how the city's new Polish settlers found themselves in a place that was not only unfamiliar to them but outright repellent given Wroclaw's Prussian-German appearance and the enormous scope of wartime destruction. The immediate consequences were an unstable society, an extremely high crime rate, rapid dilapidation of the building stock, and economic stagnation. This changed only after the city's authorities and a new intellectual elite provided Wroclaw with a Polish founding myth and reshaped the city's appearance to fit the postwar legend that it was an age-old Polish city. Thum also shows how the end of the Cold War and Poland's democratization triggered a public debate about Wroclaw's "amputated memory." Rediscovering the German past, Wroclaw's Poles reinvented their city for the second time since World War II. Uprooted traces the complex historical process by which Wroclaw's new inhabitants revitalized their city and made it their own.

Louisiana presents an overview of the culture in the New World and Louisiana, including related literature, such as Longfellow's Evangeline. For the visitor, the state is divided into geographic regions such as New Orleans, the plantations, and Lafayette. For each area, tours, historic sites, and restaurants are described. The section on New Orleans celebrates the French Quarter and the local food and music. Outside of New Orleans are majestic plantations and beautiful bayous filled with cypress trees and hanging Spanish moss. Side trips from New Orleans allow visitors to sample some of the various musical tastes of the Bayou State. Zydeco music may be found in Lafayette, while Cajun music may be heard throughout the southern part of the state. Special features include information on consulates, tourist offices, banks and currency exchanges, and maps which, among other things, show distances between cities. With Louisiana , anyone can pass a good time and learn how to let the good times roll, or, as the Cajuns say rouler.

Descriptions of all the attractions and a star rating system highlight entries of �not to be missed� attractions.