Worthing is "under-selling" its great, glamorous art deco heritage

A new golden age could lie ahead for Worthing – if only it would capitalise on its “rich and fascinating” art deco heritage “with its aura of glamour.”

Leading seaside historian Kathryn Ferry fears the town is currently and significantly “under-selling” its great seaside heritage – a heritage which is still there.

“Worthing went though a big development phase during the 20s and 30s which means you have a lot of art deco buildings that have this aura of glamour and a sun-soaked inter-war seaside feel that is increasingly attractive to people.

“If you could harness that and bring people to see your art deco buildings, then that’s something that sets Worthing apart and gives you a unique selling point.”

As Dr Ferry says, in the 20s and 30s the holiday market was really opening up: “Worthing was go-ahead and really trying to maximise these opportunities and now, a hundred years later, you could do the same: you could sell art-deco Worthing as a brand. There is potential there to really package Worthing.”

Dr Ferry will be visiting the town to give a talk as part of the Worthing Pavilion centenary celebrations – and will be offering an important message as she does so, harking back to the excitement of Worthing during the interwar years.

She says it’s a rich history which could be used hugely to the town’s advantage a century later: “I think there could be a really great future for Worthing if the town started to capitalise on this fantastic heritage that it has still got.”

Dr Ferry will speak on Worthing Pavilion and the Art Deco Seaside on Sunday, July 12 at 2pm in the Pavilion Atrium with tickets available on https://wtm.uk/book/instance/1517402/

“I wanted to do the talk, and the reason I want to do it is to hear people afterwards saying ‘I hadn't looked at it like that before’ and ‘I will look at it all again.’ When you are seeing these things on a daily basis, it becomes just part of your everyday life and you don't realise what you've got. Maybe you need someone coming in from the outside to tell you that what you've got is really significant.

“And to tell you that the town should be harnessing it. I think Worthing is underselling itself. If Worthing could get it right, the heritage and tourism market is something that the town could really capitalise on. If you could harness that art deco heritage in Worthing, doing talks or walks or whatever, people would just find it so fascinating. In the 20s and 30s there was a massive expansion. More and more people had a better living standard and there were more opportunities to get to the coast and you have just still got so much of that in Worthing.

“We are just at the beginning of the centenary arc for these things, and I just wanted to do a talk in Worthing to say that you have got amazing stuff. People find that period of time so interesting because it's so glamorous. You've just got to look at the train posters.”

Kathryn is the author of a book on 20th century seaside architecture: “The story that we have been told is that the British seaside died after World War Two and that it has been a graveyard ever since. But that is just not true. I'm not dismissing the idea that a lot of these places are in trouble and that there is social and economic decline and that the decline is very real and that they face big challenges but it's simply not true that everybody got on a plane and deserted our seaside en masse.

“In the 1920s when Worthing Pavilion was opened, there was already a feeling that the rich were beginning to drift to the continent. And that's what they were trying to do with Worthing Pavilion, to keep people here by investing in brand-new facilities.”

The psychology was that the town wanted to juggle different audiences: “You had the summer day-trip audiences who were more working class and middle class but there was also the potential to make money from the more wealthy people during the winter by having facilities such as Worthing Pavilion. If you could get the two sides of it right and attract a winter audience, then that was the Holy Grail. The Pavilion was really about getting that winter audience, an attempt to make it work all year round.”

In her talk, Kathryn invites you to step back to 1926 and explore the story behind the Pavilion Theatre. Marking 100 years since the theatre’s opening, she will examine its architecture, design and lasting impact on Worthing’s seafront – a chance to discover how the Pavilion Theatre played a key role in shaping the town’s development, reflecting wider trends in seaside architecture, Art Deco and Modernism during the 1920s.

As she says, investment in seafront buildings transformed Worthing, attracting visitors and introducing bold new architectural styles.

“100 years on, Worthing could really capitalise on it all!”