Updates to Tower Block UK: general dataset

This item consists of a single .csv file which collates details of updated datasets, hosted in Zenodo, which are based on the “Tower Blocks UK: general dataset” item in DataShare. The updated datasets were produced by Ryan Browell, an institutionally unaffiliated researcher, and they build on the research undertaken by Prof Miles Glendinning on tower blocks in the UK. Details of the methodology of these updates is contained in the readme file. The general dataset, upon which these updates are based, is of multi-storey blocks built between the 1940s and 1970s in the United Kingdom, from images mostly taken in the 1980s. Context: Tower Block UK is a project supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund, bringing together public engagement and an openly-licensed image archive in an attempt to emphasise the social and architectural importance of tower blocks, and to frame multi-storey social housing as a coherent and accessible nationwide heritage. The Tower Block UK image archive is a searchable database of around 4,000 images of every multi-storey social housing development built in the UK. The photographs were largely taken in the 1980s by Miles Glendinning and are made available here for public use. As many of the blocks documented and photographed have since been demolished, the archive functions in part as a repository of information on an important aspect of UK heritage that is now vanishing. The archive itself catalogues multi-storey blocks as part of the developments within which they were initially commissioned and built. It gives details of notable dates, such as when local authorities approved the developments and when construction began or finished. Alongside this, the archive provides information on the local authorities, architects, and other agents involved in the processes of commissioning, designing, and constructing mass social housing. While the most historically 'accurate' identification labels in the database are the original overall development or project names, the archive also contains details of the individual blocks built.