Brooke House, Town Square, Basildon, Essex
This 14 storey tower block of flats was built in 1960-62. The architect was Anthony B Davies, chief architect and planner to Basildon Development Corporation. Sir Basil Spence was consultant adviser on the town centre and Ove Arup and Partners were the structural engineers. Brooke House was designed to introduce high density housing into Basildon town centre. It was designed visually to provide an impressive, tall, landmark to counterbalance the surrounding low rise shopping centre. It was built from concrete, with dark brown handmade brick cladding and aluminium glazed screens and windows. The plan is a rectangle with 6 flats on each floor. The block is raised 8m above ground on 8 'V'-shaped reinforced concrete pilotis. Brooke House was named after the then Minister of Housing and Local Government, Henry Brooke MP.
