history

The real work begins…today! Restoring Madeira Terrace and the Green Wall
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The real work begins…today! Restoring Madeira Terrace and the Green Wall

Today, 18 November, is a momentous day in the history of east Brighton. For finally, after a decade of closure, work begins to restore a section of Madeira Terrace.

According the Council news release, “Work to restore the first 28 arches and build a new, fully accessible lift is expected to be completed in summer 2026. An important part of the renovation of Madeira Terrace is improving biodiversity and revitalising the Green Wall, which has grown along the East Cliff wall for more than 150 years, predating the Terrace itself. During 2022 /23, expert surveys of the plants forming the Green Wall were conducted to help us understand more about their health and how best to ensure that there is a thriving Green Wall is again after the renovation. Those surveys revealed that all the plants have rooted into the wall at various points, which has allowed them to grow so tall. These plants now get most of their nutrients and water from the wall through their aerial roots, rather than from the ground through their main stems. As a result of this it is unfortunately not possible to retain the majority of the existing spindle plants, given the works that are needed to the wall.”

man with beard and green plaque commemorating 150 years of madeira drive green wall brighton

For us at Building Green, it’s always a sad day to see biodiversity loss, especially at a site where the planting is over 150 years old.

Our campaign to safeguard the longest, oldest green wall in Europe began in 2006. We are proud to have secured the designation of the wall as a Local Wildlife Site in the City Plan, and seen it lauded in international conferences, and on the TV.

Building Green, with partners, But we recognise the need to ensure the supporting wall is safe and sound, and we note the Council’s commitment to fully restore and enhance the green wall.

“The detailed plans have been carefully developed with conservation specialists and with input from the Advisory Panel. They will lead to the Green Wall becoming more biodiverse and greener when the work is completed. It will cover far more of the cliff wall than it currently does. However, it will take time to achieve this and the first step towards a restored Terrace is to remove the majority of the existing vegetation. This is necessary so that essential engineering works can be carried out to the face of the A259 retaining wall, which also supports the Terrace. The new climbers and planting will need to establish and have time to grow up the wall. The planting works are the last stage of the project, and I’m looking forward to seeing the results when we are once more be able to enjoy this iconic piece of our heritage in 2026“.

  • Councillor Jacob Taylor, Deputy Leader and Cabinet member for Finance and City Regeneration

The Council continue: “One of the first operations the contractor will do is to remove the vegetation. It is only after this that the challenging task of dismantling the structure can get underway. This will be followed by breaking out of the concrete deck. It is the deterioration of the deck that was one of the main reasons the Terrace was closed to the public.

artist impression of restored madeira terrace showing Concorde 2 and green wall

To enable the deck to be dismantled safely the Royal Crescent Steps will be temporarily closed for about one week in early December. Notices of the closure will be put up at the top and bottom of the steps to provide advanced notice of the exact dates. Alternative access points at Duke’s Mound and the Colonnades will remain open throughout the works.

The parking bays between the Royal Crescent Steps and Concorde 2/Madeira Shelter Hall will also be removed and won’t re-open until the Terrace opens in summer 2026, but we will announce alternative provision next month. The bays to the east and west of this area will remain available.”

You can read more about the Green Wall revitalisation on the Council’s Madeira Terrace restoration web page, and watch our film here.

The Great Green Wall of Brighton – new film explores the role of nature in cities
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The Great Green Wall of Brighton – new film explores the role of nature in cities


A new film by LatestTV about nature in cities will premiere on Sunday 15 January 2023 at 3pm at Latest Bar, Brighton.

Made by LatestTV with James Farrell from Brighton & Hove Building Green and The Human Nature Partnership, the film ‘The Great Green Wall of Brighton’ celebrates the role nature plays in the health and wellbeing of towns and cities, and focuses on some of the special features of Brighton & Hove.

First, the health-giving properties of the sea – including the tradition of sea bathing established in the town.

Second, the ‘green wall’ on the eastern seafront in Brighton that was planted by the Victorians 150 years ago this year. The green wall is a unique and influential example of integrating architecture and planting for the benefit of people and wildlife, pre-dates Madeira Terrace, and is the longest and oldest green wall in Europe.

James interviews a range of national and local experts, and the film includes stunning new footage from Latest filmmaker William Ranieri alongside historic images.

“People in Brighton and Hove have opportunities to be close to nature which are the envy of many other cities. The seaside, downs and urban green spaces all boost our happiness and wellbeing – and provide places for wildlife to thrive. This film tells this story – from sea bathing in the 1700s, to Victorian innovation in urban design – and shines a light on the very unique and special ‘green wall’ we have on the eastern seafront.”

James Farrell, Brighton & Hove Building Green

“We are really pleased to have been producers of this film and to be premiering it! I have been on the community advisory group for Madeira Terraces for a year or so and know how important the Green Wall is to Brighton. James Farrell tells the story beautifully.”

Latest TV Director Bill Smith

Screening

The film can be seen on LatestTV studio at 13-17 Manchester St, Brighton, on Sunday the 15th January at 3 PM
RSVP for tickets to the premiere by contacting LatestTV.

Biography

James Farrell is Founder of Brighton & Hove Building Green, a community network which has been instrumental in protecting and managing Madeira Drive Green Wall, and raising the profile of green infrastructure in the city.

He is a coach and environmentalist, Founding Partner at The Human Nature Partnership, and Director of The Natural Coaching Company, and author at Nature Connection Books.

Contact James.

Is this the first public art ever inspired by a green wall?! New neon installation in Brighton
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Is this the first public art ever inspired by a green wall?! New neon installation in Brighton

Is this the first public art ever inspired by a green wall?! Neon artist Andy Doig has created a new installation under the arches at Madeira Drive.

Part of a sequence of events to explore to ‘reimagine the seafront’, and part of the celebration of the 150th birthday of Madeira Drive Green Wall.

Go see it between 4 and 10pm, just west of Concorde 2.

Read more here.

Happy birthday to Madeira Drive Green Wall – the oldest, longest green wall in Europe! 150 years old this year.
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Happy birthday to Madeira Drive Green Wall – the oldest, longest green wall in Europe! 150 years old this year.

Happy birthday to Madeira Drive Green Wall – the oldest, longest green wall in Europe! 150 years old this year.

Planted in 1872, the hundreds of Japanese spindle plants have grown to create a wall almost a mile long at Madeira Drive in Brighton & Hove. Today over 100 species of flowering plants can be seen growing here, along with a range of birds and other wildlife. In recognition of its importance, Madeira Drive Green Wall has been designed a Local Wildlife Site – the only one of its kind in the UK.

The green wall forms an integral part of the East Brighton seafront, and backdrop to the famous Madeira Terrace. The terrace, and green wall, both feature in a forthcoming film from LatestTV to celebrate this anniversary. The film will explore Brighton’s historic connection to the environment, the benefits for health and wellbeing, and the plans to restore and enhance Madeira Drive for the future.

Today, Linda Standing, volunteer with Portslade Green Gym, planted a baby Japanese spindle tree to celebrate the Green Wall anniversary. Green Gym volunteers have been working at Madeira Drive for 10 years, and are vital to the care and attention the green wall needs.

Building Green supports the work the Council are proposing as part of the restoration of Madeira Terrace. This will involve safeguarding and enhancing the green wall, as well as introducing other environmental habitat.

This proposal can be viewed in the planning application summary statement here – and you can comment using this form here.

The film below sets out what is planned.

We need your photos and videos! Work starts on film of Madeira Drive and the history of Brighton & Hove’s connection with nature
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We need your photos and videos! Work starts on film of Madeira Drive and the history of Brighton & Hove’s connection with nature

Filming starts this month on Madeira Drive, to tell the unique story of Brighton’s connection with nature.

The film is being made by James Farrell from Building Green and LatestTV, and will describe modern Brighton’s origins as a city founded on the sea – especially the link between sea-bathing and health. It will explore the fascinating history of the development of Madeira Drive – as place of Victorian invention, and a place to walk in nature, to see and be seen.

The film will also look ahead to the plans to restore and rejuvenate this neglected part of the city for the benefit of local residents, workers and visitors…and the nature environment we all depend on.

We are looking for good quality photos and video of Madeira Drive – especially wildlife on and around the green wall. It can be taken on a phone, or perhaps a camera. If you have anything please send a link to info@building-green.org.uk before the end of September.

Work to start this week to maintain the Madeira Drive Green Wall at the Volks Workshop, Duke’s Mound
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Work to start this week to maintain the Madeira Drive Green Wall at the Volks Workshop, Duke’s Mound

Building Green has been speaking to the Council and its contractors following the unfortunate cutting back of the green wall at the bottom of Duke’s Mound, near the Volks Workshop.

The event triggered an outpouring of concern from the public, a wreath-laying, and commitments to establish a management plan for the Local Wildlife Site.

Improvements to the road are to start shortly, so Council contractors will be sensitively pruning back the large fig tree that grows in this section and is currently spreading into the road. The idea is to train it up, not out! Building Green have been assured that the veteran Japanese spindle plants along this section will be encouraged to continue re-growing up the cliff.

We support this work and will continue to advise.

Oscar Wilde and the green wall
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Oscar Wilde and the green wall

What has Oscar Wilde got to do with the Madeira Drive green wall?

Bear with. Madeira Road was opened in 1870, forming a new promenade along the bottom of East Cliff, and connecting people from the wealthy Brighton and Kemp Town with the seaside. Our new theory is that it was named ‘Madeira’ after the island’s greenery.

One man who did much to popularise Madeira as the ‘garden isle’ was Sir William Wilde…you guessed it…father of Oscar. An excellent botanist, he wrote of the vines and terraced gardens, praising the ‘hothouse of the open air’ that he grew to know on his visits from the late 1830s. Madeira became popular with Victorian visitors through the 19th Century for much the same reasons that Brighton did – for the health giving properties of seaside living and recreation, as well as its luxuriant gardens.

madeira-cliff_2517649a

Madeira Drive green wall was planted in 1872, and we expect that it was always part of the vision of for Madeira Road to establish vegetation to soften the hard cliff and new road, and encourage people to spend time there.

brighton seafront 1872 chain pier cliff planting people James Gray collection

A later photograph, probably about 1872/1873. By now, the Aquarium had been built, on the site of the esplanade, and the few hesitant steps towards the construction of Madeira Drive had commenced. Note the long line of sapling trees and the ladies’ bathing machines.
Both are, of course, recent copies of old stereoscopic photographs.

So Madeira Drive Green Wall is extra well named…our little slice of the ‘garden isle’ on the Sussex coast.

And what of Oscar? A frequent Brighton visitor, and sometime Worthing resident, Oscar lectured in the Pavilion in 1884, avoided long walks, and crashed his cart into the railings of Regency Square in 1894. I don’t know that he ever saw the newly established saplings of Japanese Spindle of Madeira Road…but I hope that he did.

With thanks to Derek Wright for the prompt to research this piece.

Good news – Madeira Terrace regraded to II*
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Good news – Madeira Terrace regraded to II*

Heritage England have regraded Madeira Terrace as a II* structure.

The nerds amongst you will enjoy reading the citation. A few headlines for others:

  • This designation is deserved by ‘particularly important buildings of more than special interest’
  • There is no other building like it in the English historic record (closest is a Victorian pier)I
  • It’s ‘monolithic’ form is considered very rare of possibly uniqueI
  • It is thought to be the longest cast iron structure in England and possibly the world.

The Madeira Drive green wall gets a special mention:

“Earlier, between 1830 and 1833, the natural East Cliff at Brighton was made good by the application of a concrete covering, and was then planted up to achieve a green wall which is now believed to be the oldest and largest of its kind in Europe, with over 100 species of flowering plants recorded.”

Now to save it…

(Painting by Vincent Donlin)

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Unearthed – architect design for Madeira Road

Found in a second hand shop…a framed print of how Madeira Road could have developed. By architect John Johnson, and published in The Builder, May 5, 1883, the ‘improvements’ show features that are still in place, and many now lost or never implemented.

print of madeira road east brighton 1883

Surviving still – albeit with sections lost over the years – is the ‘green wall’, running from the Chain Pier (now the sun terrace) to Paston Place. Banjo groyne is there. There is the idea of a lift from Marine Parade (the print shows two lifts) – now part of the Concorde 2 of course. There were gardens and squares in Kemp Town. There were extensive lawns and bandstands on Madeira Road. Some of these were built and maintained for many years, but have all now been lost. And there was planting in the road – hedges close to the Madeira Terrace, which this architect hadn’t envisaged.

Obviously not taken forwards are the grand looking hall to the east of the Chain Pier, and the car free streets!

print showing east brighton seafront madeira road 1883

Questions remain. Was there an architectural competition, and was the winner the Council’s own Philip Cawston Lockwood who imagined the Madeira Terrace? Whose idea was it to establish the green wall? And what is today’s vision for the future of East Brighton seafront?