Berthold Lubetkin is among the most important figures of the Modern Movement in Britain. Born in Georgia in 1901, he studied in Berlin and Paris, before moving to London in 1931. The following year he founded the famous Tecton practice with the Architectural Association graduates Anthony Chitty, Lindsay Drake, Michael Dugdale, Valentine Harding, Godfrey Samuel and Francis Skinner.

Lubetkin’s buildings are among the most iconic of the period, and include the penguin pool at London Zoo (designed in conjunction with the engineer Ove Arup) and Finsbury Health Centre.

The Spa Green Estate was designed by Lubetkin while he was working with Tecton in the late 1930s, but was not completed until 1949, by which time the firm had regrouped as Skinner, Bailey & Lubetkin. His intention was to create a manifesto for modern architecture.

Spa Green borrowed features from Lubetkin’s acclaimed Highpoint flats in Highgate, including lifts, central heating, balconies, daylight and ventilation from multiple directions, large entry spaces, and a roof terrace. Well designed fitted kitchens, including slide-away breakfast counters and ironing boards, electrical and gas appliances, and a central waste-disposal system in stainless steel, exceeded the amenities enjoyed by most of the population in the austere late 1940s. Ove Arup’s innovative concrete box-frame or 'egg-crate' construction gave each flat clear views and interiors uncluttered by beams, columns or pipes, while his aerodynamic 'wind-roofs' and open terraces provided a communal area for drying clothes, social gathering and enjoying views.

After the Grade II* listing of Spa Green in 1998, Homes for Islington with English Heritage initiated a restoration of the entire exterior plus the kitchens and bathrooms of the flats still in council ownership. Deteriorated concrete was recast, windows replaced with double-glazed steel Critall units resembling the originals, and Lubetkin’s colours reconstructed.

The architect John Allan of Avanti has written of the estate: “The first and best of Lubetkin and Tecton’s post-war housing schemes set a standard in architectural and technical accomplishment unmatched by any contemporary. Over half a century later, Spa Green still radiates a sense of optimism that defies the commonplace dismissal of flatted estates as a modern urban aberration.”