Wimpey no-fines house

The Wimpey No-fines House was a construction method and series of house designs produced by the George Wimpey company and intended for mass-production of social housing for families, developed under the Ministry of Works post-World War II Emergency Factory Made programme. "No-fines" refers to the type of concrete used - concrete with no fine aggregates.

A rapid increase in the birth rate compounded by the loss of city centre housing during the Blitz meant demand for accommodation in post-World War II Britain was particularly intense. Skilled labour and materials were in short supply and commanded high prices. Local government around the country commissioned large building projects to meet the demand, and innovative designs like the no-fines house gave private contractors like George Wimpey a compelling proposition to give the state. Wimpey's houses could be produced rapidly and cheaply, minimising the need for in-demand skills like bricklaying.

An example of no-fines concrete construction, Wimpey's design was particularly successful and many thousands were built in the late 1940s and early 1950s. In the late 1950s, the emphasis for public housing moved to high-rise accommodation.

Designed to a Ministry of Works specification, no-fines houses focused on functional design for family life. There are only a handful of variations in the houses built, and typically all variants are found on each estate:

Many examples are accompanied by a single-storey brick-built outbuilding, either in semi-detached arrangement set behind the house, or linking one house to the next.

By today's standards the houses are set in large plots of land intended to allow the occupants to engage in domestic vegetable production. This was achieved through siting in low-cost locations.

...
Wikipedia