Coldean - Bevendean History Project
Development of the Coldean Estate
The Coldean Estate
The Parkside
Estate on the northern edge of Brighton was started in 1935 when Park
Road, Ridge View and part of Rushlake Road at the east end of Coldean
Lane was developed. Building was halted by the outbreak of the Second
World War and resumed after the war with houses in Forest Road,
Middleton Rise and Arlington Crescent.The Coldean EstateThe houses in Park Road, West Drive (later renamed Rushlake Road), Ridge View and numbers 1 to 28 Coldean Lane were built by private builders when the area was under the control of Chailey Rural District Council.
In 1949 plans were submitted for a new 92 acres suburb, lying outside the Borough of Brighton, and land including Coldean Farm was purchased by Brighton Corporation. The site was an extension of the Parkside Estate, south of Stanmer Park and was bounded by Coldean Lane, Moulsecombe Wild Park, and the 400 foot contour of the Downs roughly parallel to the Ditchling road.
The plan was dated June 1949 and provided for a self contained community of 650 houses, including 23 for aged people, 4 for police, and 1 for a doctor. It included 80 lock-up garages, 12 shops, a church, primary and nursery schools and a possible site for a public house. In the 1950’s Roads were built to the west of Coldean Lane to facilitate the plan and the school opened in September 1952.
The derelict barn at the end of Selham Drive was converted into the church for Coldean in 1955. The barn first appeared on a map dated 1799-1800, part of which is shown below.
The farm barn at Coldean has been dated to about 1799-1800, which is the date on the Stanmer Estate map drawn by William Figg of Lewes, part of which is shown above. Two Architectural Historians, friends of a senior archivist at the Keep, looked at photographs of the barn before its conversion and photographs of the exposed roof timber and said, “We both agree with the estate map - we would both put it at c1800 (very like the Frog Firle barns in its walling and quoin details, and its roof seems to have a ridge, visible in the staining in the plasterwork and by the very straight ridge in the external photos.) So we see no reason in our view to doubt the text on the map.”
Photos of the Coldean Estate in 2015
