In the 1960s and 70s, Newcastle embarked on an ambitious transformation of its urban fabric in an attempt to turn the city into the ‘Brasília of the north’, now revisited in a programme of exhibitions and events at the Farrell Centre
It’s been more than half a century since the city of Newcastle embarked on a bold, modernising programme as part of a quest to turn the city into the ‘Brasília of the north’. This memorable aspiration is attributed to the visionary, later disgraced, local politician T Dan Smith, one of the key drivers in the city’s ambitious yet flawed reimagining.
Very much of their time, the changes of the 1960s and 70s swept aside the old, ushering in modern architecture and a new city planning approach. Swathes of new housing, civic amenities and infrastructure including a partially completed urban motorway network and high-level pedestrian walkways transformed the urban fabric of Tyneside. Decades on, the legacy remains mixed and highly contested.
‘It’s a subject that’s still very controversial,’ says Owen Hopkins, director of Newcastle’s Farrell Centre, which this month launches Concrete Dreams, a programme of exhibitions and events exploring both this pivotal time in the city’s recent history, and how it defines Newcastle today.
‘So much of the way we use the city and understand it today is shaped by the legacy of that era,’ he says.
The programme will consider to what extent what happened in Newcastle was unique rather than just reflective of its time. It will also ‘unpick’ the very different ways that the transformation is viewed today. Some of this, says Hopkins, is clearly generational – for example, the increased interest in brutalist architecture in recent years. And it’s complicated. As Hopkins says, you might hate the Central Motorway that cuts through the city, while benefiting from its convenience.
Concrete Dreams kicks off with Brasilia of the North, an exhibition setting out the story of the city’s transformation and the protagonists and ideals behind it, touching on notions of regional identity and the influence of Scandinavian modernism.
Rather than a linear, single narrative, it presents a ‘constellation’ of exhibits. These include a 6m-long model of the 1960s new vision for Newcastle, and the original architectural model for Owen Luder’s brutalist Trinity Square car park, famous for its starring role in the 1971 film Get Carter.
‘We’re trying to create space for a range of different responses rather than telling people how to react,’ says Hopkins, who also hopes the exhibition may soften some of the more hardened views of the time.
Hand-in-hand with this is a schools project to study the impact of three major projects from this time: the Byker Estate; Trinity Square, Gateshead; and Felling Swimming Baths.
As well as talks and events, the programme includes the installation Alison’s Room: An Extended Reality Archive by Paula Strunden. This is inspired by Alison Smithson, who studied at Newcastle University in the 1940s along with her husband, Peter Smithson. Shown for the first time in the UK, it provides an immersive-reality experience guided by a cat, Serafina, which takes participants into the worlds of several key works and references from the starting point of Alison’s study. These projects include the House of the Future and Parallel of Life and Art exhibitions, and the Hexenbessenraum, part of the Smithsons’ Hexenhaus project in Lower Saxony. The installation is part of Strunden’s ongoing research into making archival material accessible.
Concrete Dreams aims to look forward as well as back to consider how the city can address the legacy of this transformation. But there are important lessons to be learnt for today: rather than repeat the demolition and new-build approach of the 60s city vision, at a time of climate emergency, says Hopkins, the emphasis now has to be on reuse and reimagining.
Half a century ago, he says, architects and planners had real agency in shaping city development and were clearly driven by strong ideas, whether for good or for bad.
‘We’ve lost confidence in the disciplines of architecture and planning to envision the future in an optimistic way,’ he says, ‘and we need to recapture some of that.’
Concrete Dreams, including Brasilia of the North, 19 September till 1 June 2025; Alison’s Room: An Extended Reality Archive, 19 September till 20 December (booking required), Farrell Centre, Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 7RD