ABSTRACT
The growth of suburbs is intimately connected with the growth in consumption and the rise of mass consumerism. Two broad processes link these together. First, the sheer increase in the number of houses and households stimulated a demand for products to place in them. Each household would require tables, chairs, beds, crockery, utensils and so on. This process was particularly important in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and again in the interwar period. At these times there was a sustained programme of house building-substantially private but including a small though significant public sector involvement. Between 1901 and 1911, for example, London grew from 6.5 million to 7.2 million and again from 1921 to 1931 from 7.4 million to 8.2 million, growth rates of about 10 per cent in each decade. However, the rates of suburban growth were much higher because of the redistribution of the city’s population. For the first decade of the century, Jackson (1991) identifies 25 districts with growth rates of over 25 per cent (and some, such as Southgate in north London and Coulsdon in south London with rates of over 100 per cent). The post-First World War period again saw sustained and even massive growth. Up to 1931 Hendon and Mitcham more than doubled in size, Wembley increased by 260 per cent and Dagenham by almost 900 per cent. In the following eight years (to 1939) the outer suburbs of London were the major sites of expansion and Bexley, Chislehurst, Orpington, Harrow, Hayes, Carshalton and Esher all grew by more than 100 per cent.
