For a monograph published by an academic publisher, this book really stands out. The reader is presented with a cover wrapped in Roy Lichtenstein-like speech bubbles screaming BOOM CITIES, a title that refers to the brief moment in time when the future of British city centres seemed bright and shiny. The flashy cover reveals the unabated enthusiasm for urban modernism with which Otto Saumarez-Smith examines the British redevelopment schemes of the 1960s, transforming a seemingly dry topic into a thrilling story of wild ambitions and shattered dreams. The author takes us on a trip through concrete wonderland, and his fascination with the physical remains of the redevelopment bonanza of the first post-war decades is infectious. In his own words, while the cityscapes of this period might be considered ‘crap’ by many, they were certainly not boring, as they articulated British hopes and fears about the future. This ambivalence, characteristic of the experience of modernity in a broader sense, plays a pivotal role in the book's narrative. Architect-planners, defined by Saumarez-Smith as professionally trained designers who proposed vast physical solutions to the ills of the affluent society, were not the archvillains of modern planning as they have been portrayed in both historiography and popular imagination. Nor were they the apparatchiks of Labour-dominated city councils, as the Conservative party embraced the modernist project with the same enthusiasm as its socialist proponents, albeit for different reasons. Urban redevelopment could give physical shape to intangible desires and promises of mass affluence – all while allowing property developers to profit.

As Saumarez-Smith explains, the forces unleashed by post-war modernity were complicated and inter-related. Increasing prosperity resulted in growing car ownership, which in turn led to the suburbanization of residents and businesses, thus jeopardizing the social and economic viability of British city centres. At the same time, deindustrialization made cities look to the service sector as an alternative driver of economic development. Space in central areas was required for accommodating the booming economy, in particular during the early 1960s, when the planning fervour reached its zenith and the most ambitious plans left the drawing boards. From central London to the mill towns of Lancashire, urban Britain was to be reshaped to an unrecognizable extent – yet, as Boom Cities convincingly demonstrates, usually with respect for traditional street patterns and existing monumental buildings. Rather optimistically or perhaps naively, architect-planners believed it was possible to merge tradition and modernity into a coherent whole – a belief illustrated by the book's numerous sketches and illustrations of public spaces surrounded by medieval cathedrals and brand-new tower blocks. Perhaps the greatest achievement of the monograph is the bringing together of the disciplines of architectural and urban history. The oeuvres and biographies of well-known architects are seamlessly combined with reflections on broader developments in society and the built environment.

The book takes the shape of a funnel, with the first chapter outlining the developments in society that necessitated urban renewal in the first place and the second examining the redevelopment agenda from a political perspective. The remaining chapters are centred around a number of local case-studies, amongst others Liverpool, Blackburn and Bolton, refreshingly moving the focus away from over-studied London. The chapter on Blackburn works best in tying the author's premises and approaches together, with a Labour council aiming to replace the built legacies of the industrial revolution and laissez-faire capitalism with a modernist shopping centre to the detriment of local shopkeepers, who came to oppose the consumerist haven for its unfair competition. At the same time, this chapter also mentions but fails to discuss two groups of actors that are largely missing in Saumarez-Smith's narrative: those directly affected by urban redevelopment and the property sector responsible for financing and executing the schemes.

Because of its focus on the architect-planner and chosen time period, the book pays little attention to the community action groups, social and preservationist movements who rose up against the redevelopment agenda from the late 1960s onwards. Property developers – in many cases the real movers and shakers of the urban economy – are not analysed either, although this omission is readily acknowledged by the author. Incorporating a broader range of actors could have shed light on the downfall of urban modernism in Britain, which is only marginally discussed in the book's final chapter and attributed to a lack of financial means and the onset of the urban crisis. In addition, the narrative would have benefited from a more international scope similar to Christopher Klemek's The Transatlantic Collapse of Urban Renewal, which could have revealed the uniqueness of the British experience. Still, these are only minor flaws in an otherwise comprehensive, eloquent and wittily written study of a misunderstood episode in Britain's post-war history. As such, Boom Cities should also be read as a call to urban historians to explore the space-age architecture of the post-war period in real life before it is too late, as many buildings – despite growing reappreciation from younger generations – are still threatened with demolition.