HISTORY
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HE RED-BRICK buildings of Cale Street’s Sutton Dwellings have proudly housed Chelsea’s working classes for 101 years. Funded entirely from the will of Victorian
entrepreneur William Richard Sutton, the blocks were built to provide small, smart homes for the poor at a time when council housing was practically unheard of. It remains social housing to this day, comprising 462 flats across 15 blocks. However, the group that owns the estate – Affinity Sutton, the descendent of William’s mighty charitable trust – says it “does not meet today’s living standards” and plans are afoot to massively redevelop the site. No planning applications have yet been made, but the owners envisage knocking down many of the blocks on the vast 4.5-acre plot and building modern structures in their place. Completed in 1912, Sutton Dwellings was the product of an enormous bequeathment from self-made millionaire William, a carrier and brewer who made a fortune outsmarting the Royal Mail by delivering parcels to the
Sutton Dwellings has provided homes for low-income Chelsea residents for more than a century. But with its owners believing the estate is stuck in the past, many of its blocks may be replaced with modern buildings. Jamie Downham looks at its remarkable history
Above and far right: Sutton Dwellings today. Pictures: Geoff Aiken, 2011 Middle: The estate in 1962.
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