Need Christmas Pressie Ideas??? Here’s One if You Love 1930s Architecture

Apologies – a non-China posting here, but hopefully interesting all the same and an important cause down in a part of the world I have a strong affection for:

I know, I know, you’re expecting me to recommend one of my books as a Christmas present (and by the way why not consider a copy of the beautiful Old Shanghai A-Z (paperback or Kindle) for your loved one – a charming and beautiful book remembering the old Shanghai) but here’s an even more worthy cause. The beautiful Saltdean Lido has managed to survive as a classic example of a gorgeous 1930s outdoor art-deco swimming pool. There’s very few left now in England thanks to the ignorant and the barbarous knocking them down for Tesco superstores and out-of-town retail parks!!  As a kid I used to swim every summer in the Southbury Road Lido in Enfield, now sadly gone and turned into a giant Pizza Hut for North London’s more obese and cardiac challenged (I shit you not my friends!!).

Anyway Saltdean is, of course, threatened by some barbaric property developer who wants to destroy most of it and turn it into miniscule but highly priced flats. There’s been a long running and excellently supported local campaign down in Sussex to save Saltdean Lido- so far successful. However, property developers, like hyenas, rats and cockroaches, are quite hard to fully eliminate and they keep on coming. To raise funds the campaign has launched a lovely 2012 Calender – it’s lovely and available at the ridiculously cheap price of a fiver and a bit more to pack and post it to you – some lovely art-deco images and a wonderful way to try and save a true national treasure of a building. Click here for details.