Portslade-by-Sea : beach-front houses, Western Esplanade

Image: © Jim Osley Taken: 5 Apr 2021

Exclusive development (ca.1909) of beach front houses. "An unusual seafront development, known as Hove Seaside Villas, is noted for its celebrity residents. It lies on the esplanade with a private beach and provides a striking rendered and castellated silhouette from Hove Lawns and across the port." - https://ww3.brighton-hove.gov.uk/sites/brighton-hove.gov.uk/files/downloads/conservation/UrbanStdy_West_Hove_final.pdf. "Judy Middleton in her "Encyclopaedia of Hove & Portslade" provides a fascinating history of this unusual development. The villas were designed by architect E J Holland for developer Michael Paget Baxter (MPB). From 1908 onwards piles were sunk 20 feet into the foreshore to support a huge concrete platform on which the villas were erected using 12" thick concrete blocks and railway sleepers. MPB and his wife lived in no.1 at the eastern end, the first one to be built. Originally it had tennis courts and a rose garden. They stayed put, even during WW2, when the villas were requisitioned by the Royal Canadian Airforce and an ack-ack gun was installed on the roof." - http://brightonbits.blogspot.com/2011/07/hove-seaside-villas-2.html.

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