4 LANDSCAPE CONTEXT

“Turn a corner in Lewes, emerge from one of its narrow twittens, or survey the hill-nestled town from up on Mount Caburn and reasons for the Ouse Valley town’s reputation as a, (indeed for many, the) jewel in the South Down’s crown makes an immediate and indelible impression. It is hardly surprising then that the SDNPA seeks to maintain the best of the town’s built fabric character, sensibility, and atmosphere, while riding the dynamic of change and as fully and best as possible.”

Oliver Lowenstein

This section seeks to place the Phoenix in the context of its surroundings in both Lewes and the wider South Downs, considering the history of town as a centre of industry, manufacture, creative endeavour and radical thinking. It explores the site’s historical and cultural importance, current dereliction, opportunities and constraints, as well as the visual correspondence between and impact of the proposed plans and its edge conditions and views.

4.1 LEWES IN THE DOWNS

Lewes is often described as being nestled within the South Downs, the peaks of Black Cap, Malling Down and Mount Caburn just beyond its boundaries. In certain light, the surrounding landscape appears to close in, creating dramatic glimpses at the ends of streets and between buildings of chalk cliffs and rolling hills.

These views add to the town’s remarkable beauty; its famous Norman castle, narrow twittens, Georgian high street, diversity in architecture and access to nature. In nearly every direction, trails lead away from the bustle of the town and into the quiet of the Downs.

The town is found at the point where the River Ouse flows through a narrow gap in the eastwest line of the South Downs, perhaps giving it its name from the Old English ‘læwe’, meaning incision, the result of erosion and water run off over millions of years. Underneath the surface are layers of chalk, sands, clay and iron ore. The town was likely founded in the sixth century, becoming an important settlement in the Kingdom of Sussex. After the Norman invasion, William de Warenne built Lewes Castle, and his wife Gundreda founded the Lewes Priory. It was already becoming an important centre for commerce and government in the south of England, and was the site of the famous Battle of Lewes in 1264 when Simon de Montfort defeated King Henry III’s army leading to the establishment of the first English Parliament. This established a rich tradition of dissent, which endures to this day. Indeed, Harvey’s Brewery, one of the town’s most famous exports, describes Lewes as a “rebellious little town”. The Marian Persecutions of 1555-1557 brought the execution of the 17 Protestant Martyrs in Lewes, still commemorated in the Lewes Bonfire celebrations where the town is taken over by the seven Bonfire Societies comprising 6,000 members. Thomas Paine, the author of the Rights of Man, became radicalised while living in Lewes from 1768 to 1774, before he headed off to make his contribution to the American and then the French revolutions. In Lewes, Paine wrote and published a pamphlet, The Case of the Officers of Excise, which led to the creation of the first civil service unionisation.

The modern incarnation of Lewes began when it became a borough and corporation in 1881, the first generation of democratic government for the town. In this period, the town was a centre for printing, iron and cement working, the epicentre of which was the Phoenix site, as well as being the administrative centre and County Town of Sussex. The town was also growing, with the Edwardian suburb of Wallands being followed by the post-first war neighbourhood of Nevill and the post-second war new estates at Landport and Malling. The tradition of dissent continued, with the town successfully resisting the East Sussex County Highways plans in the 1960s to drive an “inner relief road” through the centre of the town, instead proposing the creation of a tunnel through the Downs at Cuilfail to take traffic around the town instead of through its centre. One of the leaders of this campaign, the redoubtable Elizabeth Howard, is today commemorated with a local bus bearing her name.

The Phoenix site

The Phoenix is inexorably linked to the name John Every, who founded the Phoenix Iron Works in 1835. It was his grandson John Henry Every who truly established the foundry on North Street, growing it to become the largest employer in Lewes – by 1930, the foundry employed about 500 men and women.

The Ironworks eventually closed in 1986, by then the East Sussex Engineering Company, but its products remain visible today, from steel structures on the Phoenix site, to manhole covers, kerbstones and boot scrapers, lamp standards, railing and bandstands across Sussex, encompassing both decorative and functional designs. This industrial manufacture had a profound effect on the town and wider region’s economy, and, of course, the Phoenix site and the surrounding areas, with Every building terrace housing on nearby Lancaster Street and Talbot Terrace for his workers.

In the 2010s, the site was marked for redevelopment. Lewes Phoenix Rising, a community interest company, prepared an alternative proposal to those put forward by the landowner, Santon, under the banner “Affordable Homes. Places to Work. Brilliant Buildings.” This reflected the town’s need for new homes and workplaces that meet the needs of the town and its younger population, who in particular continue to be forced to move away by high property prices and the lack of workspace to match the needs of the large number of makers and small businesses who want to work in the town.

The employment use of the site was conceived as creating continuity with the innovation of the Every’s Iron Foundry in the manufacture of iron structures, and the most recent use of the site as a collection of creative industries making use of the old industrial buildings.

When Santon decided to sell the site without implementing its proposals, Human Nature stepped forward, with the support of Lewes Phoenix Rising, to take up the challenge of creating a new neighbourhood on the site.

4.2 NEW LEWES

But it’s also a town of community activism, which has become ever more important since Covid and with the deepening of the cost of living crisis. Community food services, a repair cafe, a library of things, a school uniform bank and other initiatives in which people share their resources and recycle and reuse materials have been organised in response to the increasing levels of poverty in some parts of the town. Much more needs to be done in and with these communities, to provide affordable homes, training, fairly paid new work opportunities, and improved services so that people can more easily stand on their own two feet.

Human Nature’s work at the Phoenix is weaving itself into this impressive social and entrepreneurial fabric. Bringing more than £300 million of new investment, hundreds of jobs (many of which will be sustained beyond the build programme to become centres of excellence in natural construction), significant community facilities and amenities and a catalyst for and practical agent of the new, sustainable economy. We seek to become an active and enthusiastic partner to people and organisations working together to help all of the people of Lewes flourish in a fairer, more sustainable world, with work and new businesses to suit.

Despite its historic jewels, Lewes is no museum and the Phoenix with its innovation and role in the vanguard of the future of the built environment, will forge new opportunities and, as Oliver Lowenstein says, new histories.

Lewes was early to respond to the climate crisis, with Common Cause being set up by local people in 1991 to promote sustainable food growing, out of which grew the two markets which serve Lewes with local produce. Lewes was one of the first Transition Towns, with the aim of creating community-led change for a sustainable and just future founded on wellbeing, and once headquarters of Greenpeace International. By 2019 all but one of the town’s elected members to the District Council were Green Party members, and the Town Council also has a strong Green Party presence alongside passionate and environmentally-savvy Liberal Democrats.

In many ways, Lewes is now a green town, with concerns about the climate and nature crises are at the heart of its civic society. This was codified in the Town’s Neighbourhood Development Plan, which placed Ecosystems Services at the heart of the plan, as promoted by Dr Colin Tingle, a leading environmentalist and citizen of Lewes.

Expressions of environmental concern and local action continue to grow. The Climate Hub and Ovesco, Love our Ouse, among many other initiatives, are becoming ever more effective and influential. Meanwhile, Cycle Lewes and Living Streets are gaining traction with their campaigns to humanise and decarbonise the movement network and establish less-polluting, more people-friendly, active forms of travel. And new businesses are growing too. Beak and Abyss breweries have risen to complement the redoubtable, muchloved Harveys; small, independent cafes and restaurants – always a feature of the town –are beginning to gain a firmer foothold. Our inspiring makers, artists and retailers continue to enrich Lewes with their creativity and enterprise. There are signs of new life on the retail park across the river from the Phoenix. The Depot, with its cinema screens, café, meetings spaces, events and public garden is now part of a burgeoning cluster of appealing activity and destinations along Friars Walk and the junction with Station Road. It sits by the railway station alongside the pizza venue under the arches, and within easy reach of Caccia & Tails, the Lansdown Arms, Symposium wine bar and shop, two Thai restaurants, Fork, Ground, the wonderful Union Music store, Pestle & Mortar noodle bar and more. Lewes FC is a pioneer of community ownership and equality and goes from strength to strength under inspiring leadership.

4.3 GEOGRAPHY

Archaeological surveys have uncovered remains from different time periods, dating back to the Roman era and spanning across centuries. For example, excavations during the demolition of the northern part of an earthen bank referred to as the Green Wall, now a Scheduled Ancient Monument, suggested this to be of mid-Saxon origin and formed part of the town’s defences. By the 1830s, the town had started spreading west of the site, where a paper mill had been established and by the end of the century, more industrial buildings were part of the site, with timber yards and sheds, corn and saw mills, and the established Phoenix Iron Works, which continued to expand northwards well into 1930s and 1950s.

The fine grain of the urban development within the historic centre had started expanding towards the foundry to include narrow streets, where flint-lined cottages were built, as well as public houses intended for workers and visiting sailors. Industrial decline meant that the development on site became largely redundant, leading to the ironworks being sold to asset strippers, broken up and resold in the 1960s, finally ceasing trading in 1986. By this point, the layout of the site was completely different, with terraced housing having been demolished within the site and the current industrial estate constructed.

Many of these elements remain today amongst a number of warehouses built around Phoenix Place. The Phoenix Causeway was constructed in 1969 across the iver Ouse and it has since acted as a barrier to the rest of the town, separating the the Phoenix site physically and in terms of townscape.