Orientalist architecture in Victorian and Edwardian beach resorts

I have often referred to Orientalist art in this blog, largely that created by late 19th century French, British, German and Russian artists who spent time in Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt, Israel or further East. Examine for example the markets,  armed male guards and life in the harem.

But there were only two references to Orientalist architecture in this blog. Firstly the Royal Pavilion in Brighton was designed in a style that was a mixture of Moorish, Indian and other tastes, all built in stone and iron. Secondly the pier in Nice was an immense structure with a bold dome, covering a bandstand, concert hall, theatre and sea bathing. The rooms were apparently decorated in exotic Orientalist styles – Japanese, Indian, Turkish and Moorish

Then along came John MacKenzie whose excellent book Orientalism: History, Theory and the Arts proposed that western architecture received genuine inspiration from the East, but in a much more specific way than I had imagined. In the architecture of leisure, Orientalism was particularly prominent in Britain – in bandstands in parks and beach resorts, in kiosks and later in theatres. The influence of Oriental forms, motifs and colours was everywhere, in buildings’ interior decoration, textiles, carpets and light fittings. Architects merely flirted with the East but interior decorators passionately embraced it.

Nowhere was this better seen than in the Victorian bandstands which were once the centre of parks and beach resorts around the UK. The first domed bandstand was made from iron and erected in the Royal Horticultural Society's gardens in South Kensington in 1861.

Parks were becoming increasingly popular places for families to spend their spare time and bandstands provided a musical centre to thrill the tired workers. So popular were they that in the later Victorian and Edwardian eras, a band­stand could draw crowds of up to 10,000. By 1900, 1,200 bandstands had been built in Britain alone. And not just on the beach. Every public park worth its salt wanted a beautiful bandstand - the city of Leeds alone had 18 bandstands in all its parks!

Brighton West bandstand, built in 1866
photo credit: Daily Mail

Wolverhampton bandstand, built in 1896
photo credit: Daily Mail

I also recommended Fred Gray’s book Designing the Seaside: Architecture, Society and Nature to the students. The Orientalism of seaside architecture clearly offered visitors the dream of being in a distant and exotic place, a place of leisure and sexual promise. It was a significant new, grand and opulent style, without needing to reference any one, specific Eastern culture. There was no political or military goal; just fun-filled and fashionable leisure buildings on, or overlooking the beach. The beach, with its focus on health and leisure, was certainly different and more exotic than everyday life in a grey inland city.

Only one quibble remains in my mind. The bandstands, which were often inspired by the expansion of the empire into India, were primarily utilised by the 25,000 brass or military bands in the UK. I wonder if the military bands at least partially reminded the holiday makers of Britain’s colonial battles and victories.

The breakthrough in popularising seaside Orientalism came with Brighton’s West Pier of 1866. Drawing on the nearby Royal Pavilion for its inspiration, designer Eugenius Birch made great use of decorative cast iron in a partly-copied and partly-invented style called Ornamental. Cast iron lampposts encircled with serpents, Indian style openwork screens (an almost direct imitation of the Pavilion’s own screens although in iron rather than stone) minarets, pinnacles and domes were all in a vaguely oriental conception.

Following his West Pier experiment, Birch took the Oriental theme further in the large Hastings Pier pavilion of 1872. Seized by other pier des­igners, pleasure pier Orientalism in Britain reached its peak with Mr St George Moore’s Marine Palace of 1901, built on Brighton’s third pier. From piers, Orientalism spread to a wide range of seaside buildings including bandstands, seafront shelters, pavilions, winter gardens, theatres and concert halls. The Royal Pavilion in Brighton might well have been the inspiration, but the Pavilion was architecture for a privileged elite. The piers and bandstands, on the other hand, were pleasure centres for a widening mass of ordinary families on holidays.

Middlesbrough bandstand, built in 1871
photo credit: Daily Mail

The most loved bandstand was Brighton’s birdcage bandstand, built in 1884 as part of a wider scheme of improvement for the town’s western seafront. Like much seaside arch­itecture of the late-Victorian period, the cake-icing decorat­ion reflected its relaxed, beachy context. The clearly extravagant and Oriental style of the decoration of this bandstand evoked distant lands, particularly some of the Oriental buildings in Southern Spain.

In C19th Britain, cast iron was the most important material used in Oriental architecture; the cast iron decoration could transport people to another distant or imaginary place. But cast iron decoration was never approved by all the critics. John Ruskin, arbiter of mid-C19th taste, thought it was a vulgar and cheap substit­ute for real decoration.

Pleasure-pier Orientalism in Britain
Hastings Pier, first opened in 1872
and restored in 2011-2016

Maharajah's Well

in Stoke Row, Oxfordshire
designed by magistrate Edward A Reade and
donated by his Highness The Maharajah of Benares in 1864

By the interwar years, more modern architectural critics saw seaside cast iron and Orientalism as unfashionable, fussy Victorian mediocrity and a hindrance to the development of modern resort towns. Of the 1,200 bandstands built in the UK by 1900, many were scrapped in WW2. Later others were demolished ..as public parks and seaside resorts declined. Today fewer than 500 remain but a major effort is now being made to restore some of the most beautiful Victorian bandstands to their original Oriental glory.