Liquid Assets

In Liquid Assets, the third book of the Played in Britain series, journalist Janet Smith, author of a history of Tooting Bec Lido and herself a keen swimmer, traces the development of Britain's surprisingly rich stock of lidos, starting with their 18th and 19th century predecessors through their fashionable heyday in the Thirties, to their battle for survival today.

Lavishly illustrated with both archive and contemporary photographs, Liquid Assets highlights some of the nation's outstanding architectural examples; the columns and colonnades of Blackpool, the Art Deco water stadium at Portobello, Edinburgh (the first lido to have a wave machine in 1936), and the curvaceous, Le Corbusier-style chalets of the Cold Knap lido in Barry, South Wales.

Kenneth Cross, the distinguished architect of so many of Britain's swimming pools, believed that fresh air, sunlight, exercise and companionship were essential elements of a full life and that lidos were not a luxury but 'an urgent and ever insistent national need'. But if lidos were once to be found in virtually every town and city, since 1945 many have been closed, often despite the efforts of thousands of vociferous campaigners. Liquid Assets charts the best of these lost lidos, including one in Purley were the towering concrete and steel diving board now forms the curious centrepiece of a garden centre.

Liquid Assets also provides a unique listing of all lidos still open in Britain, with detailed case studies of the most impressive, including the Art Deco glories of the triangular-shaped Jubilee Pool, Penzance, Saltdean Lido, near Brighton and Tinside Lido, Plymouth, all opened in 1935 and recently renovated to popular acclaim. With our summers seemingly getting ever hotter, are we about to enter a second golden era for Britain's much loved lidos?

Never before has there been a comprehensive account of this, one of most popular forms of recreational architecture. Played in Britain invites readers to dip in and discover anew the best of the nation's Liquid Assets.

Liquid Assets is sponsored by S+P Architects, specialists in designing swimming pools and leisure centres. The company is currently engaged in the design of the London Aquatic Centre for the 2012 Olympics and the refurbishment of the Royal Commonwealth Pool, Edinburgh, and was also recently reponsible for the revamp of London Fields Lido.