Fabricating Lureland A History of the Imagination and Memory of Peacehaven, a Speculative Interwar Garden City Development by the Sea

"Winckler is a skilled storyteller. Lureland is interesting and, at times, gripping. As a reader it's difficult not to care about the town and its cast of characters, its slick marketeers, its pioneers looking for a better life and its present residents watching the town adapt to the demands and fads of the twenty-first century.

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"Imagery is an essential part of the story of Peacehaven - hence the popular name tag of Lureland - and in revisiting it, Julia Winckler skilfully weaves memory and imagination, words and photographs, into a fascinating reconstruction of a place that has so often been dismissed as an aberration, a proverbial blot on the landscape.

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Interview with the author Julia Winckler for Latest TV.

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"Fabricating Lureland is a fascinating journey through the history of Sussex's pioneering Garden City. It draws on a wealth of archive material and personal recollections to uncover the development of the town from its post-WW1 origins through to the present day. It is generously illustrated, and conveys both the hopes and fears which this bold experiment prompted among residents, campaigners - and even celebrities." John Leaman, Author and Data Analyst, Brighton

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"Die Autorin hat eine persönlich-biographische Beziehung zu Peacehaven. Davon ausgehend gelingt es ihr - mit eindrucksvollem und überaus vielfältigem Archivmaterial, in Kombination mit Oral History - das verändernde Image der Stadt nachzuzeichnen und greifbar zu machen. Es ist eine grandiose Microstudie, die wissenschaftliche Maßstäbe setzt. Dabei kommt vor allem zum Ausdruck, wie fruchtbar Bilder als Primärquellen in der ethnografisch-historischen Forschung sein können - wenn man sie methodologisch sinnvoll im wissenschaftlichen Kontext verwendet. Die Arbeit ist deshalb ein Paradebeispiel für die Visuelle Kulturwissenschaft: Ohne Berührungsängste und Animositäten folgt sie transdisziplinären Maßstäben und hält insofern ein großes Spektrum an wissenschaftlichen Perspektiven bereit. Sie ist eine Bereicherung für alle, die sich in fachübergreifender Hinsicht mit dem Phänomen der Visualisierung im Kontext der kollektiven Erinnerung und des kollektiven Vergessens beschäftigen. Damit ist die Arbeit wissenschaftlich-methodologisch ebenso im Kontext der ethnografischen Forschung über die modernen sozialen Netzwerke und medialen Echokammern zu sehen. Sie liefert hierzu wertvolle forschungspraktische Grundlagen." - Dr. Ulrich Hägele, Center of Media Competence - ZFM, Universität Tübingen

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"Winckler's remarkable archival research for her monograph delves beneath the often snobbish opprobrium heaped on Peacehaven to produce a nuanced and layered history of its origins and evolution through its visual representation in promotional and documentary images. She interprets these through her careful analysis of the themes and ideologies they embody across time in the imagining of place and in informing residents' testimonies and her own creative practice." - Lizzie Thynne, University of Sussex

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"In her recent study entitled Fabricating Lureland, Julia Winckler mobilises urban and human geography alongside urban and rural history to explain how a speculative twentieth century interwar estate on the Sussex Downs came into existence and evolved over subsequent decades. It is fascinating to see how the town of Peacehaven developed from its original inception as New Anzac-on-Sea (as the estate was originally named), a place for defeated soldiers to settle after Gallipoli, then somewhere for damaged but victorious soldiers to make a home after the First World War, and eventually for anyone wanting to get away from the dirty air of London. These attractions were all expressed in the commercial advertising of Charles Neville and other entrepreneurs who saw an opportunity to get rich; but were soon followed by the biting criticism of Downs lovers including Clough Williams-Ellis, not to mention the fury of the rich hedonists who formed the Bloomsbury group.