www.elsevier.com/locate/geoforum

Geoforum 36 (2005) 477–494

Differential productions of rural gentrification: illustrationsfrom North and South Norfolk

Martin Phillips

Department of Geography, University Of Leicester, University Road, Leicester LE1 7RH, UK

Received 16 October 2002; received in revised form 10 August 2004

Abstract

This paper focuses attention on the making of space for rural gentrification, both discursively and materially. The paper empha-

sises the differential constructions of gentrification within urban and rural studies. Connections are drawn between production-side

theories of gentrification, notions of the �post-productivist countryside� and studies that have related rural demographic change and

gentrification with planning and property relations. Drawing on these three sets of ideas, the paper explores gentrification in rural

Norfolk. It is argued that the contemporary geography of rural gentrification may in part reflect historic structures of landownership

as well as settlement classifications associated with the land-use planning system. Country and District level analysis is followed up

by detailed study of gentrification of two villages in Norfolk, which highlights how gentrified rural spaces may be produced in rather

different way and through different agencies, and as a result takes different forms.

� 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Gentrification; Rurality; Social construction of space; Property; Norfolk

1. Making space for rural gentrification: an introduction

The term gentrification is often interpreted as a lar-

gely urban phenomena, with urban gentrification beinga widely acknowledged research subject—even research

frontier (van Weesep, 1994)—and having become a het-

erogeneous and contested discursive space, with highly

divergent interpretations of gentrification being ad-

vanced and debated. In contrast, rural gentrification ap-

pears as a small, restricted and rather unremarkable

discursive space. A relatively small number of people

use the term rural gentrification, and when it is used isoften accompanied with little or no justifying commen-

tary: rural gentrification is either largely ignored or pre-

sented as a commonplace referent to some changes in

contemporary rural life. The title of this paper in one

sense points to the differential production of these two

0016-7185/$ - see front matter � 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

doi:10.1016/j.geoforum.2004.08.001

E-mail address: mpp2@le.ac.uk

discursive spaces, and to a continuing endeavour (see

for example, Phillips, 1993, 2001b, 2002b, 2004) to

transform the discursive space of rural gentrification

into something more akin to that of the urban, wherebygentrification is seen as an important but congested and

contested term. As noted in Phillips (2001b), this trans-

formation does not imply that rural researchers neces-

sarily have to import all the ideas and practices of

urban studies into the rural discursive space as there

may well be significant differences between processes

and senses of gentrification in rural and urban areas, dif-

ferences which need to be reflected in the interpretationsof gentrification adopted (see also Smith and Phillips,

2001). However, there may also be significant common-

alities of process and complex interconnections in

senses of urban and rural gentrification which are wor-

thy of exploration, and which if anything appear to

increase, not lessen, the complications of interpreting

gentrification.

478 M. Phillips / Geoforum 36 (2005) 477–494

However, the title of this paper also has another

meaning, in that the attention will focus on material

rural spaces—the spaces of rural landscapes out there

beyond academic discussion and debate (although not

necessarily completely untouched or untouchable by

those debates)—and how in a variety of ways manyare becoming susceptible to, and made ready for, rural

gentrification. In making this argument the paper will

draw upon the notion that gentrification involves the

refurbishment of residential properties and an accompa-

nying change in social composition, ideas which can be

seen to circulate in the discursive spaces of both urban

and rural gentrification studies, although they have

arguably been much more explicitly and extensively cir-culated in the former.

The next section of the paper will seek to substantiate

this last claim, outlining some exponents of this view of

gentrification within urban studies and explicit and im-

plicit connections with rural studies. Amongst these con-

nections are some interesting questions surrounding the

relationship of contemporary gentrification acts as the

legacies of past actions and relationships. These issuesare further explored in a second section which considers

the relevance of urban �production-side� theorisations ofgentrification to studies of one particular rural district in

England, North Norfolk. Finally, the paper will focus

on the production of spaces for rural gentrification with-

in two villages in Norfolk.

2. Production theories of urban gentrification and rural

studies: charting some connections

First use of the term gentrification is widely attrib-

uted to Glass (1964) and here there is a clear sense that

gentrification is about both the �refurbishment�, or doingup, of properties in an area and associated changes in its

social composition:

‘‘One by one, many of the working-class quartersof London have been invaded by the middle clas-ses . . . . Shabby modest mews and cottages . . .have been taken over . . . and become elegant,expensive residences. Larger Victorian houses,down graded in an earlier or recent period . . .[to] lodging houses or . . . multiple occupation -have been upgraded again . . . Once this processof �gentrification� starts in a district it goes on rap-idly until all or most of the original working-classoccupiers are displaced and the whole character ofa district is changed’’ (Glass, 1964, p. 33).

Whilst gentrification debates have spawned a whole

host of other ontological conceptions of gentrification

(see Phillips, 2002b, forthcoming-a), this original sense

of gentrification has continued. The so-called �produc-tion-side� theorists, for example, have promoted the

notion that gentrification should be understood as the

productive investment of capital related to the closure

of so-called �rent-gaps� in order to realise profit (see par-

ticularly Smith, 1979a,b, 1982, 1996). These rent gaps

occur where there is a devaluation of properties within

an area which leads to there being a gap between the ac-tual payments—or rents in a very general sense—being

made by users of property and the potential level of

financial returns which might be expected for this area.

This gap means that there is an opportunity for high lev-

els of profit to be made by those people or institutions

that can revalorise these areas by investing capital in

new use of these areas which can reap greater rental val-

ues. Hence, for Smith, gentrification is the result ofcycles of disinvestments and investment of capital.

Although this notion has been widely explored and

debated in the urban context (Clarke, 1988; Clarke and

Gullberg, 1991; Hamnett, 1991; Ley, 1986; Knopp,

1990a), there has been little explicit exploration of the

approach within rural contexts, where the emphasis has

generally been on the movement of people rather than

capital (cf. Smith, 1979b). Cloke and Little (1990, p.164), for instance, talk of gentrification as being ‘‘class-

dictated population movements’’ into accessible rural

areas whereby there is ‘‘an immigration of middle-class

residents at the expense of the lower classes’’, while

Smith and Phillips (2001, p. 457) argue that ‘‘the distinct

consumption practices of in-migrant households are cen-

tral to the processes of gentrification’’ occurring in rural

WestYorkshire. Smith and Phillips indeed propose thatthe notion of rural gentrification might be replaced by

the term �rural greentrification� to ‘‘stress the demand

for, and perception of, �green� residential space from in-

migrant households’’ (p. 457). This concept places clear

emphasis on population movement, which is reiterated

in Smith (2002, p. 386) where stress is placed on ‘‘the

importance of migratory and population dynamics with

processes of gentrification’’. The term greentrificationalso lacks the class associations of gentrification (read

as gentry-fication, making more gentry), and as such

might be seen as a new manifestation of both the ‘‘ano-

dyne terminology’’ (Smith, 1996, p. 32) associated with,

but lacking the critical connotations of, gentrification,

and also the ‘‘aversion to notions of class in rural stud-

ies’’ identified by Murdoch and Marsden (1994, p.

199); (see also Phillips, 2004, p. 26). Indeed, whilst stud-ies such as Cloke and Little (1990), Smith and Phillips

(2001) and Smith (2002) make no reference to the argu-

ment of people such as Smith (1979) that gentrification

should be viewed as revolving around the movement of

capital rather than, simply, the movement of people, they

all do clearly recognise class dimensions to rural change.

Many other studies whilst addressing the same issues as

these studies have largely eschewed notions of gentrifica-tion and class, preferring instead to couch their studies in

terms of a range of other concepts, such as counter-

M. Phillips / Geoforum 36 (2005) 477–494 479

urbanisation, rural migration, rural re- and de-popula-

tion, rural demographic change, rural development, rur-

al regeneration, and rural restructuring (e.g. Day et al.,

1989; Marsden et al., 1993; Murdoch and Marsden,

1994; Lewis, 1998; Abram, 1998; Stockdale et al., 2000;

Beyers and Nelson, 2000; Nelson, 2001). Many of thesestudies enact what I have elsewhere (Phillips, 1998a,d)

identified as a �restricted social imagination� focused on

tangible, easily enumerated, mappable, and relatively

uncontested phenomena, while others adopt more criti-

cal, political-economic orientated approaches, often

employing notions of capital movement and investment

although making little or no direct reference to conceptu-

alisations of gentrification, and in some cases being quitesceptical about the theoretical value of notions of class

(see Phillips, 1998a).

Despite its taciturn usage in rural studies, as noted

elsewhere (Phillips, 1993, 2002a,b, 2004), a series of

parallels can be discerned between urban gentrification

and rural research, even when restricting attention to

production side theorisations of gentrification. First,

studies such as Little (1987) and Phillips (1993) high-light the rapid gains which can made from buying

and selling houses in the countryside, and also the exis-

tence of a significant number of rural residents under-

taking substantial building work on their property to

heighten its exchange value. Second, there has been a

continuing series of studies examining rural housing

development (e.g. Shucksmith, 1990; Murdoch and

Marsden, 1991, 1994; Murdoch and Marsden, 1994),and while there has been a tendency to focus primarily

on new house construction as opposed to the refurbish-

ment of existing housing stock (see Phillips, 2002), even

these studies may be seen to lie with the orbit of pro-

duction side theorisations of gentrification given the

inclusion, at least within some conceptions, of large-

scale urban redevelopment schemes involving ground

clearance and large-scale newbuild (see Smith, 1996;A. Smith, 1989; Fainstein, 1994; cf. Warde, 1991; Ham-

nett, 1992). Third, and closely related to the above

point, state promotion of urban gentrification may be

seen to also have some rural analogues in the recent,

but largely unexamined, promotion of country/market

town redevelopment (DETR, 2000; Countryside

Agency, 2001). Fourth, there have been some studies

which have drawn upon Rose�s (1989) notion of �mar-ginal gentrification�, with Phillips (1993), for instance,

identifying that some residential refurbishment and

rebuildings in rural Gower were being undertaken by

people on moderate incomes seeking to gain access to

highly competitive housing markets (see also Cloke

et al., 1995, 1998), while Sherwood and Chaney

(2000) looked at the gains that accrued on the re-sale

of homes bought by former council-house tenants, sug-gesting that this may be seen as a form of gentrifi-

cation.

A fifth area where some connections might be drawn

between production side theorisation of gentrification

and the rural studies is with respect to notions of the

�post-productivist� countryside. As Wilson (2001) notes,

although the term post-productivism has come to be

interpreted in a range of different ways (see also Evanset al., 2002), some of its earliest advocates placed partic-

ular emphasis on the de-valorisation of land and building

with respect to agricultural capital and its revalorisation

with respect to other capital networks (e.g. Kneale et al.,

1992; Murdoch and Marsden, 1994). Post-productivism

hence relates, at least in these accounts, to the de-valori-

sation of land and building with respect to agricultural

production and its uneven revalorisation with respectto other, more consumption orientated, capital net-

works. Rural gentrification likewise may be seen as one

form of the revalorisation of resources and spaces which

have become seen as unproductive or marginal to agrar-

ian capital, and indeed a variety of other rural capitals.

The �barn conversion� provides perhaps the clearest

example of the such processes of re-valorisation, but

the re-valuation of rural spaces and resources is not justrestricted to barns but may include a whole range of

other agricultural properties, including the houses of

farmers and farm workers, as well as a range of other

rural buildings, such as schools, railway stations and

churches. Furthermore, just as in the context of urban

studies gentrification has been seen to involve not simply

the flow of capital into residential development but also

into retail and leisure facilities (see Phillips, 1993), so inthe rural context one can see the revalorisation of spaces

formerly used by agrarian and other rural capitals for

leisure and retaining activities.

Whilst the term post-productivism may not necessar-

ily be interpreted temporally (see Phillips, 2004) it often

has been and in doing so points to a further set of par-

allels between theorisations of gentrification and rural

studies. Smith (2002, p. 388) argues for the develop-ment of �sensitive temporal analysis of gentrification�,and temporal analysis has often figured prominently

in both �production-side� and other theorisations of

gentrification. It has, for instance, already been

mentioned that Smith (1979b, 1982, 1989) argues that

gentrification needs to be understood as cycles of

investment and deinvestment which occur over time.

Zukin (1990, p. 49) also emphases historical sequencesof capital investment, claiming that gentrification can

be considered ‘‘schematically as a large circuit of cul-

tural capital that is in turn made up of smaller, special-

ized circuits, each of which joins labour, finance and

capital investment on physical infrastructure’’. Zukin

identifies a range of gentrification practices associated

with different phases in the circuit of capital, and in-

deed different agents of gentrification (see Table 1).At this last point, Zukin�s analysis may complement,

if not be entirely commensurable with (see Phillips,

Table

1

Urbangentrificationasaconsumptionspace

forcapitalcirculation

Types

ofcapitalandassociatedpractices

ofgentrification

Phase

inthecircuitofcapital

Typeofagency

gentrification

Labour/products

Physicalinfrastructure

Finance

Architecturalrestorations

Conversionofold

townhousesandlofts

Investm

entin

�avantgarde�

art,restaurants

Directcapitalinvestm

ent

Individualised

Productionofgentrificationproducts—

i.e.

replicas,Victoriana,chintz

Creationofensemble

offacilities

tocreate

adowntown�scene�

Creationoflocalreal

estate

market

Intensificationofcapital

Individualisedbutmore

empowered

Publicationofmagazines

Creationof�landmark�districts—

i.e.

legally

recognised

area

Agencies

adoptareaas

atourist

andretaildestination;

fictiouscapital(credit)encourages

further

expansion

Symbolisationofcapital

Nationalandmulti-national

firm

s

Circulationofideasandpersonnel

Expansionofcentralbusinessdistrict

Investm

entin

new

office

construction

Diffusionand

corporatisationofcapital

Largecorporate

capital

Source:

BasedonZukin,S.(1990)�Socio-spatialprototypes

ofanew

organisationofconsumption:therole

ofrealculturalcapital�,

Sociology:37–56.

480 M. Phillips / Geoforum 36 (2005) 477–494

2004), so-called �consumption� or �production of gentri-

fers� approaches which from the late 1970s often identi-

fied temporal sequences of types of gentrifiers and

associated �stage models� of gentrification (e.g. Clay,

1979; Holcomb and Beauregard, 1981; Pattison, 1983;

Kerstein, 1990; Ley, 1996). The precise status of thesemodels has been contested, with Beauregard (1986, p.

37), for instance, claiming that this approach create

representations which ‘‘lack any sense of historical

and spatial contingency’’, a viewpoint which has clear

resonances with some recent criticisms of high profile

concepts in rural studies such as �post-productivism�and �rural restructuring�. Evans et al. (2002, p. 325),

for instance, argue that post-productivism is an overly‘‘abstract and over arching’’ concept for theorizing

‘‘the complexity of empirical change’’, while Hoggart

and Paniagua (2001) argue that the notion of rural

restructuring often lacks conceptual substance, fre-

quently being used simply as a different way of saying

social change, and that when it is used more precisely

to refer to ‘‘major qualitative . . . changes in social

structures and practices . . . that are both inter-relatedand multi-dimensional’’ (p. 42), studies often exhibit

‘‘a lack of historical vision’’ (p. 55), too readily reading

contemporary changes as signally some radical break

from the past. Here there are clear echoes too of

Thrift�s (1989) earlier, more general critique of the �per-ils of �transition models�, which included the over-

emphasis on the strength of transitions through neglect

of the presence of earlier parallels with contemporarychanges.

It is certainly clear that the devaluation of rural space

is not simply a feature of the �post-productivist era� butthat there have also been earlier phases of devaluation of

agricultural land, such as in the agricultural depression

of the 1870s and early twentieth century which saw

declining investment of capital in agricultural produc-

tion and land being taken out of production as a re-sponse to falling commodity prices (see Newby, 1987).

There was also in this period a significant change in

the structure of landownership with many large rural es-

tates being broken up and much of this land being pur-

chased by agricultural owner occupiers. Newby, for

example, argues that:

‘‘Between 1918 and 1922, one quarter of the landsurface of Great Britain changed hands—a saleof land unprecedented since the dissolution ofthe monasteries in the sixteenth century . . . ..Many great estates were . . . . broken up and some-thing of a decisive shift in the class structure ofrural society thus occurred. Since the land was soldprimarily to sitting tenants there thus emerged anew breed of owner-occupier commercial farmerswhose significance was to increase as the twentiethcentury progressed’’ (Newby, 1987, p. 153).

M. Phillips / Geoforum 36 (2005) 477–494 481

The causes of this transformation, and some of its

immediate impacts have been the subject of long debate

(see Goodman and Redclift, 1991; Newby, 1987), and

while this debate may appear to be far removed from

the study of contemporary rural gentrification, a link

may be forged through Spencer�s (1997, p. 78), claimthat the socio-demographic makeup of much of the Brit-

ish countryside is formed by ‘‘events in the present’’

which are ‘‘rooted in structures created in the past’’.

Spencer develops his claims in the context of the study

of rural depopulation (see also Spencer, 1995), but it

can be suggested that his arguments may have equal rel-

evance to the study of rural gentrification. In particular,

it may well be that contemporary actions to gentrify rur-al spaces are very much set in contexts which are legacies

of past actions and relations. In other word, spaces are

made ready for contemporary gentrification in part

through practices of the past.

This issue will form the principal focus of the rest of

this paper, which will examine the production of spaces

of gentrification within rural Norfolk. The following

section will elaborate further on the connections be-tween Spencer�s arguments, production-side theorisa-

tions of gentrification and rural studies, the latter

being drawn primarily from those who have studied gen-

trification and/or rural Norfolk. Many of these studies

relate specifically to one local authority district, namely

North Norfolk, and reference will also be to contempo-

rary planning documents and analysis of Census infor-

mation relating to this district. The subsequent sectionin the paper will then focus of the production of spaces

of gentrification in two Norfolk villages, one in the dis-

trict of North Norfolk and one in the neighbouring dis-

trict of South Norfolk.

3. Rural population change and spaces of gentrification

3.1. Initial reflections

For production-side theorists of gentrification the

movement of people is not accorded as central signifi-

cance as the movement of capital, although it can be

seen as both an important constituent and consequence

of the latter�s movement. As such even with this capito-

centric approach, population movement may be auseful indicator of gentrification processes, both

contemporary and historical. It is at this point that

clear connections can be forged with the work of Spen-

cer on rural depopulation and some early studies of

rural gentrification.

Spencer (1997, p. 78) argues that contemporary pat-

terns of rural depopulation may be causally associated

with the historical presence of �closed parishes� whichare defined as those which ‘‘have along history of dom-

ination by a principal estate proprietor or a small num-

ber of landed agriculturalists’’. These areas have often

been contrasted with �open parishes� in which there is

a much more diverse structure of ownership, although

the precise delimitation of each has been varied and de-

bated (see Mills, 1980; Bowler and Lewis, 1987; Banks,

1988; Short, 1992). Spencer argues that up until the for-mation of the post-war planning system, major land-

owners in closed parishes often acted to prevent or

minimise residential growth, whilst in open parishes

there was more scope for population expansion. After

the 1947 Town and Country Planning Act, landowners

continued to exercise influence over rural demographics

through, in some cases, a retention of a hegemonic polit-

ical, social and economical position (or as Newby et al.,1978) phrased it, through �property, paternalism and

power�), but also because the planning system took the

existing distributions of population and development

as given. As Spencer (1997, p. 79) comments, ‘‘local

authorities tended to formalise the status quo rather

than try to refashion it’’, with small settlements in closed

parishes being designated as non-growth areas, while

settlements in open parishes which had already experi-enced growth being designated as areas where residential

development was to be allowed or even encouraged, in

so-called �growth-centres� or �key settlements�.Spencer develops his arguments primarily in relation

to demographic change and levels of housebuilding in

the countryside (see also Spencer, 1995), although he

does make some reference to ‘‘the conversion of redun-

dant agricultural structures into residential use’’ by‘‘middle-class groups belonging to the service class’’

seeking ‘‘to create their rural idyll’’ (Spencer, 1995,

p. 165), and also points to the colonisation of certain

parishes by ‘‘middle-aged gentrifiers’’ (Spencer, 1997,

p. 89). Gentrification can, however, occur without any

change in population numbers, or indeed changes in

numbers of dwellings, but even in such cases, Spencer�sarguments about the significance of land-ownershipand planning policy may have relevance. Indeed, one

of the earliest studies to use the term �rural gentrifica-tion� developed very similar arguments with respect to

the rural planning system, suggesting that development

control policies in South Nottinghamshire and North

Norfolk may have been ‘‘influenced the geographical

impact of gentrification in rural areas’’ (Parsons, 1980,

p. 17). In particular he suggests that gentrification, lar-gely conceptualised in terms of an expanding middle

class presence, was greatest in ‘‘non-selected villages’’

and least in ‘‘selected villages’’, or ‘‘growth centres’’, a

feature which he attributes to the lack of low to medium

cost local authority house construction in non-growth

areas. Cloke (1983, p. 110) suggests a very similar geog-

raphy of gentrification, claiming that in ‘‘pressurised

rural areas . . . restrictive policies in small areas attractthe gentrification process and prevent the building of

dwellings for local need’’.

482 M. Phillips / Geoforum 36 (2005) 477–494

3.2. Applications within North Norfolk

According to Cloke (1983, p. 62), the planners of Nor-

folk were �trendsetters� in the development of selective

growth and key settlement policies, with County Council

officials undertaking a series of studies on service provi-sion and settlement size in the 1960s and early 1970s

(Ayton, 1976; Green, 1966; Green and Ayton, 1967; Nor-

folk County Planning Department, 1975; Shaw, 1976a,b,

1978; Stockford and Dorrel, 1979). Both Parsons (1980)

and Cloke (1979) Cloke (1983) document that the County

Council� s (Norfolk County Council, 1972) Interim Set-

tlement Policy set out a selective growth and key settle-

ment policy, which was incorporated into the 1977Norfolk Structure Plan (Norfolk County Council, 1977)

and also, albeit with some modification into the 1980

Norfolk Structure Plan (Norfolk County Council,

1980). As noted above, for Parsons this policy quite spe-

cifically impacted of the geography of gentrification with-

in at least one of the county�s districts, North Norfolk.

Cloke (1983) notes that the Chief Planning Officer

was amongst those who had written critically on key set-tlement policies (Shaw, 1978). However, the presence of

these polices can still be discerned in contemporary pol-

icy making in the county. The 1998 North Norfolk Dis-

trict Plan, for example, outlines a �development

strategy� which distinguishes between ‘‘areas where

growth is to be directed’’, ‘‘areas where there will be lim-

ited development opportunities’’ and �areas of develop-ment restraint� (North Norfolk District Council, 1998,p. 81). Once more these areas are apparently closely tied

to existing settlement size, with areas of growth being

�towns�, areas of limited development being �small towns

and large villages� and areas of development restraint

being �Selected Small Villages� and the �Countryside�. Itis hence perhaps unsurprising that, as Table 2 shows,

levels of population change in the District between

1971 and 2001 varied with settlement designation, asalso did, interestingly in the light of Spencer�s (1997)

arguments about open and closed parishes, the propor-

tion of households in rented accommodation.

Table 2

Population change, tenure and settlement designations in North Norfolk, 19

Settlement Designation, 1998 Local Plan

Population change

1971–2001

Growth towns 79.26

Small town 55.44

Large villages 36.64

Selected small villages 30.46

Other parishes 7.64

All parishes 25.52

Sources: Figures derived from OPCS 1971 Census Small Area Statistics, Ward

2001 Census, Key statistics, accessed via Caseweb, Manchester Information a

Norfolk District Council (1998) North Norfolk Local Plan, Cromer, North N

Spencer, and also Bowler and Lewis (1987), suggests

that the size of the private rented sector recorded in

twentieth century Censuses is a good preliminary indica-

tor of whether an area had a closed or open land own-

ership structure at the close of the nineteenth, with

closed parishes often having a large private rented sectorwhich stemmed from the provision of housing for estate

workers. The 1971 Census provides the earliest easy

accessible source of such information at the local level,

with the information being published at the local level

within County Reports (OPCS, 1976) and also now

accessible in digital forms through the ERSC Data Ar-

chive. It should be noted that the measure is very much

a surrogate measure of land ownership and that this it-self may have undergone considerable change between

the close of the nineteenth century and the collection

of the 1971 Census.

More direct sources of information on land owner-

ship are available, including the so-called �LloydGeorge�s Domesday� survey of landownership estab-

lished by the �Finance (1909–1910) Act� and itself very

clearly bound up with transformations in landownershipand the power of the landed classes in the early twenti-

eth century. Short (1989, p. 2) claims that this source

‘‘represents by far the largest data bank of information

on such issues as landownership’’. He does, however,

identify a series of problems associated with this source

material, including, critically for this research, some

associated with the establishment of geographical

boundaries of assessment. The survey which sought tomake ‘‘a valuation of all the land in the United King-

dom’’ (10 Edw. VII, Section 26 (1)), was administered

through Income Tax Parishes which were generally,

although not universally, equivalent to one or more civil

parishes. As Short (1989) documents, no list detailing

the relationship between Civil and Taxation parishes

has been preserved. It is possible to establish their rela-

tionship by recourse to so-called Valuation Books estab-lished for each Taxation Parish, although this is, as

Short (1989, p. 30), acknowledges, ‘‘an arduous task’’

at any scale above that of a parish (civil or taxation).

71–2001

Average percentage

Household change

1971–2001

Households in private rented

accommodation, 1971

123.53 19.70

89.69 26.94

67.77 31.13

52.93 32.14

30.45 49.95

49.21 37.10

Library computer file SN1182, UK Data Archive, University of Essex;

nd Associated Service (MIMAS). Settlement designations from North

orfolk District Council.

M. Phillips / Geoforum 36 (2005) 477–494 483

For the present, therefore, the use of Census derived sur-

rogate measures, despite their potential limitations, has

to suffice when examining these issue of spatial varia-

tions across local authority districts, although reference

will be made later in this paper to the 1910 valuation for

two specific parishes in Norfolk.As well as considering the limitations of these mea-

sures in general, attention also needs to be paid to the

precise values used as indicators of open or closed land-

ownership structures. In their analysis Bowler and Lewis

use a cut-off figure of 80 percent, although Spencer

(1997) suggests that this is too high in the context of

South Oxfordshire where many landowners had dis-

posed of much of their rented housing stock before the1960s, and uses a relativistic measure of over twice the

local average as indicative of closed parishes. If this

measure is used on the data included in Table 2, a cut

off figure of 74.2 percent produces figures which lend

support to Spencer�s claim that past land-holding struc-

tures are drawn into contemporary land development

policies and patterns of population change (see Table

3). Not only are the closed parishes entirely coincidentwith settlements designated as either �Selected Small Vil-

lages� or �Countryside�, but there is also a sharp differ-

ence in population change over the period 1971 and

2001 between open and closed parishes within these

two settlement categories.

Spencer (1995, p. 154) also claims research on rural

population change has been overly focused on ‘‘the

redistribution of people’’ and has paid insufficient atten-tion to change in ‘‘the number of households and dwell-

ings’’. This argument may be seen to also have relevance

within the context of rural North Norfolk where two

quite contrasting images of demographic change can

be discerned. First, the district was widely associated

with rural depopulation in the 1960s and 1970s. Drudy

(1978, p. 2), for instance, argued that North Norfolk

was an area which had seen a rural population declinewhich was similar in extent, ‘‘and in some cases, worse

than’’, that which was to be found in ‘‘areas of tradi-

Table 3

Population change in open and closed parishes in North Norfolk,

1971–2001

Settlement Designation,

1998 Local Plan

% of �closed�parishes

Average population

change 1971–2001

(%)

Closed Open

Growth towns 0.0 – 79.26

Small town 0.0 – 54.77

Large villages 0.0 – 36.64

Selected small villages 0.89 �56.95 31.98

Countryside 5.36 �6.25 7.67

Sources: As Table 2. Note: Closed parish defined as having over twice

the 1971 District average percentage of households living in private

rented accommodation.

tional depopulation’’, such as mid-Wales and the High-

lands and Islands of Scotland, where a ‘‘landscape of

depopulation’’ (Weekley, 1988, p. 127) was frequently

invoked involving unoccupied properties falling into

dereliction. Shaw (1978), on the other hand, argued that

Norfolk witnessed rural population growth and risinghousing demands through the 1960s and 1970s. These

apparently paradoxical interpretations may in part re-

flect the differential growth patterns outlined earlier.

Shaw (1978, p. 78–9), for instance, emphasises popula-

tion growth and notes that this is concentrated in ‘‘those

villages where most new development was felt to be

appropriate’’. Cloke (1983), on the other hand, notes

how Shaw�s analysis also reveals how other villages inthe county experienced population decline over this per-

iod, a point that is also evident in Table 3 in that closed

countryside parishes experienced an overall decline in

population between 1971–2001.

Shaw and Cloke also note that many of these villages

experiencing population decline were subject to quite

substantial house construction. This seeming further

paradox illustrates Spencer�s claim that research needsto consider changing relations between the people,

households and dwellings. In particular his work, and

work by people such as Weekley (1988) and Lewis

(1998), has highlighted how declining population num-

bers does not necessarily involve household abandon-

ment of dwellings. Lewis, for instance, records a

decline in the number of people and households in the

neighbouring district of Breckland between 1961 and1971, but notes that the figure was less than one percent

for household losses. In the case of North Norfolk, the

average level of change in the District�s non-urban par-

ishes in this period was actually an increase of popula-

tion of just under one percent, while the average

number of households actually grew by over 6.5 percent.

However, as Fig. 1 shows, such overall figures can mask

considerable variations between parishes, and the ten-dency of those with low population densities to have

experienced reductions in both population numbers

and households, whilst those with above average popu-

lation densities saw both population and household

numbers increasing, with the latter increasing to a great-

er extent than the former. These figures suggest that

in the smallest settlements imagery of a �landscapeof depopulation� may have had some validity inNorth Norfolk in the 1960s, 1 although in many other

1 Parsons in the thesis from which his 1980 paper was drawn, gives

an example of one settlement where 1 in 3 dwellings were unoccupied

but argues that this was due to locally restrictive letting policy and

that, in general, although North Norfolk was ‘‘experiencing wide-

spread depopulation of its villages’’ (Parsons, 1979, p. 329) this was

not leading to extensive amounts of un-occupied property but rather to

‘‘widespread under-utilisation of housing facilities’’ whereby very small

households, including a large number of single-elderly, were living in

family size dwelling.

Table 4

Average size of the �service class� in North Norfolk parishes of differing

population densities, 1971

Population density quartile

(people per square kilometre)

Average size

of the service class

(% of classed households)

Lowest quartile (<0.31) 23.2

Second quartile (0.31–0.41) 21.6

Third quartile (0.42–0.76) 17.0

Highest quartile (>0.76) 16.7

All parishes 19.6

Source: Figures derived from OPCS 1971 Census Small Area Statistics,

Ward Library computer file SN1182.

Fig. 1. North Norfolk population and household change, 1971–2001.

484 M. Phillips / Geoforum 36 (2005) 477–494

settlements there was continuity or growth in household

occupation, albeit accompanied by decreases in house-

hold size, a decrease which in some cases spelt a declinein population numbers even though the number of

households was static or increasing.

This pattern of change is quite commensurable with

the demographic analysis of people such as Weekley,

Spencer and Lewis and may also be indicative of gentri-

fication. Spencer (1997, p. 75), for instance, has argued

that divergence between household and population

trends may be seen as a product of gentrification in thatnet losses to an area�s population may occur when

‘‘affluent households comprising one or two persons

(often middle aged or elderly)’’ move into a house previ-

ously occupied by a larger family. In other words, there

is depopulation through population turnover, a turn-

over which also involves a change in the social composi-

tion of the area. Given that it has already been shown

that the divergence between trends in population andhousehold numbers was greatest in the least densely

populated areas, it might be expected that the greatest

change in social composition would also occur in these

areas.

Table 4 shows that the class structure of North

Norfolk recorded in the 1971 Census indicates that the

highest concentrations of people in the so-called �ser-vice-class� were to be found within the least populatedparishes. These figures would lend support to Parsons�argument that rural growth settlements will have a rela-

tively small �middle class� because of the construction of

low to medium cost housing in these settlements. It

should, however, be noted that the �service class� as con-structed by the Census may well from ignore significant

differences in work and market situations (see Phillips,

1998c, 1999a). Furthermore, the decline of council houseprovision following the 1980 Housing Act might be seen

to somewhat undermine Parson�s line of arguments

about the significance of social housing in accounting

for the geography of gentrification. Indeed, a number

of studies (e.g. Milbourne, 1998; Beazley et al., 1980)

have suggested that the sale of council housing proper-

ties has been proportionally greatest in smaller rural set-

tlements, while Chaney and Sherwood (2000) have

suggested that these sales, at least in rural Northampt-

onshire, were accompanied by a substantial influx of ser-

vice-class households. This would suggest that not onlymay the decrease in social housing have been greatest in

small rural settlements, but also that this decline may it-

self contribute to the gentrification of these areas

through population turnover.

More generally, the divergent trends in household

numbers and population size within the less densely

populated parts of rural Norfolk suggest that popula-

tion turnover may be of greater significance in explain-ing the geographical variations in gentrification

identified by Parsons. As such rural gentrification may

have greater commensurability with urban gentrification

than Parsons (1980, p. 3) acknowledges, given that sev-

eral urban commentators have argued that population

displacement should be seen as a defining feature of gen-

trification (e.g. Zukin, 1990; Cameron, 1992).

M. Phillips / Geoforum 36 (2005) 477–494 485

If population turnover is a key, for some even defin-

ing feature, of rural gentrification, then an important

issue is how to account for its propensity to occur in

the least densely populated areas. Again clear parallels

can be drawn between urban and rural studies of gentri-

fication. For instance, as noted earlier, Spencer (1995)makes reference to these areas being particularly attrac-

tive to middle-class in-migrants desiring some rural

idyll, while Parsons (1980) suggests that these areas

may attract in-migration by people concerned about

house price security. Taken together these arguments

point to housing in low density settlements being desired

as a �positional commodity�: ‘‘something which is fixed

in supply and whose consumption is dependent uponone�s position in society’’ (Phillips, 1993, p. 126).

Numerous studies of urban gentrification have drawn,

explicitly or implicitly on the notion of positional con-

sumption (e.g. Jager, 1986; Mills, 1986; Bridge, 2001a;

Bridge, 2001b), with Zukin (1990) and Ley (1996) mak-

ing some reference to particular types of space being de-

sired by gentrifiers (see Phillips, 2004 for a fuller

discussion of this). Zukin (1990, p. 40), for instance, sug-gests that gentrification constitutes a ‘‘prototype’’ of a

new ‘‘organisation of consumption’’ centred on areas

which are ‘‘[g]eographically central, low-rise but densely

constructed’’ and which have a housing stock that has

commercial and industrial heritage. She adds that

although these areas require some conversion to their

physical infrastructure to make them conform to the de-

mands of gentrified modern living they have desirable‘‘cultural signifiers’’, with a series of ensembles of la-

bour, commodities and finance being invested sequen-

tially in the area by a range of different agents of

gentrification (see Table 1).

As I have argued elsewhere (Phillips, 2004), Zukin

starts her analysis of gentrification at the point at which

various forms of capital starts to become invested in an

area. As such it may be seen to neglect two importantissues. First her account may be seen to enact what

Caulfield (1989) describes as a ‘‘black box’’ approach

to culture whereby various signifiers are identified as

attracting further investment, but there is little or no

analysis of why these signifiers have this function and

how they originated. Similar comments might be ap-

plied to the notion of rural space as a positional com-

modity in that the concept may be seen to underplaythe complexity of the rural idyll (see Cloke et al.,

1995, 1998; Phillips, 1998b,c). Caulfield�s (1989, p.

620) claim that the connections between gentrification

and culture have not been ‘‘well-mapped’’ may be seen

to apply to rural as much as urban gentrification,

although analyses such as that of Caulfield (1994),

Ley (1996) and Smith and Phillips (2001) do serve to

highlight some aspects of the symbolic construct ofdesirable spaces for gentrification (see Phillips, 2004

for further discussion).

A second line of criticism also relates to the point of

entry of Zukin�s analysis in that it neglects the argu-

ments of people such as Smith (1982, 1996) who have

suggested that gentrification should be analysed not sim-

ply as a process of capital investment but also involves

prior de-investment and devaluation of an area, pro-cesses which very much relate to circulations of capital

which extend beyond the immediate vicinity undergoing

gentrification. Although this argument has been criti-

cised (e.g. Ley, 1986, 1987, 1996), as noted earlier it is

one which has some interesting parallels with arguments

raised in a rural context relating to the notion of a �post-productivist countryside�. Interestingly a set of studies ofrural depopulation in Norfolk by Drudy (Drudy, 1978,1987; Drudy and Drudy, 1979; Drudy and Wallace,

1971) make similar points about the need to consider

wider movements of capital in understanding change

in housing situations. In particular, he argues that rural

depopulation in North Norfolk should be set in the con-

text of the region�s agricultural economy. He character-

ised the district as an area of prosperous agriculture and

argued that this prosperity had been brought aboutthrough the substitution of capital for labour, and a

resultant fall in the agricultural labour force. He argued

that whilst depopulation is often associated with eco-

nomic marginality, itself a product of agrarian restruc-

turing which means farmers in some regions become

uncompetitive (see Drudy and Drudy, 1979), in North

Norfolk these changes, whilst producing regional eco-

nomic prosperity, also produced rural depopulation byremoving occupational opportunities in rural areas. In

addition he suggested that these changes altered the

housing situation in many villages in that the process

of capital substitution not only devalorised the labour

power of the agricultural workers but also many of the

properties held by agricultural landowners.

One aspect of this change in housing was that with

fewer agricultural workers there were fewer tenants tolive in tied cottages, whilst at the same time many agri-

cultural landowners were seeking sources of finance to

enable the substitution of capital for labour. As a num-

ber of studies have outlined (e.g. Bettley-Smith, 1982;

Bowler and Lewis, 1987), for many landowners this

combination of circumstances was resolved by selling

off their rented accommodation to realise capital to in-

vest in agricultural production and/or in the purchaseof more land, a practice which acted as a further stimu-

lus to out migration as many former tenants could not

afford to purchase properties. Out migration was also

stimulated, so Drudy argued, by a loss of various ser-

vices within the village, with this decline in services being

initially triggered the decline in the agricultural popula-

tion of the village.

Despite the widespread concern over rural depopula-tion at the time, such out migration was not necessarily

accompanied by dwelling abandonment and declining

2 The size of the �service class� for Censuses up until the 2001 was

calculated on the basis of amalgamating the Census figures for Social

Class I (professional occupations) and Social Class II (intermediate

occupations) in the manner outlined by Thrift (1987). For the 2001

Census the occupational classification of Social Class (derived from

and frequently still referred to as the Registrar General�s classification(see Marshall et al., 1988; Phillips, 1991) was replaced by the �National

Statistics Socio-Economic Classification� (or NS-SEC). For this Census

the size of the �service class� was calculated on the basis of the

operational sub-categories of NS-SEC which are seen as being

equivalent to Social Classes I and II as laid out in Office of National

Statistics (2004). Caution needs to be exercised in interpreting the

figures for at least three reasons. First, the figures prior to 2001 are

derived from the Censuses� 10 percent samples, and given the small

population of these settlements, are likely to fluctuate widely on the

basis of quite small variations. Second, changes in the construction of

the Census� Social Class classification, as well as the movement to the

NS-SEC may produce further variation. Finally, the figures shown are

derived from differing spatial frameworks: the 1971 data being parish

level figures, the 1981 data from ward data, and the 2001 figures from

parish level data created from Output Areas.

486 M. Phillips / Geoforum 36 (2005) 477–494

household numbers in that people might move into these

properties. However, the tenurial and associated agricul-

tural changes may have been of significance for contem-

poraneous and subsequent gentrification. First, it

appears likely that many tenants were unable to afford

to purchase properties when estate landowners decidedto convert them from rented properties, with the proper-

ties instead being bought by more affluent more �middle

class� households. Parsons (1980, p. 17), for instance, re-cords that in his study of twelve villages in North Nor-

folk and Nottinghamshire, ‘‘landlords were selling off

properties previously rented to indigenous population’’,

while in Oxfordshire, Spencer (1997, p. 89) argues that

tenurial restructuring in the parish of Stoke Talmagetriggered ‘‘greater turnover within the existing dwelling

stock than the parish had hitherto experienced’’ with

the area becoming ‘‘colonised by middle-aged gentrifi-

ers’’. Spencer concludes that ‘‘landowner disinvest-

ment . . . created a supply of potentially gentrifiable

properties inhabited by relatively powerless social

groups who were easily persuaded (or forced) to move

away’’ (p. 89), a comment which has striking parallelswith Beauregard (1986, p. 47) claim that gentrification

requires not only the creation of gentrifiable housing

but also ‘‘the creation of prior occupants for that hous-

ing who can easily be displaced or replaced’’. Gentrified

population turnover does not necessarily have to involve

depopulation, and Parsons (1979) identifies cases in

North Norfolk where ‘‘occupied housing or former sin-

gle person dwellings’’ came to be occupied by youngfamilies, suggesting that ‘‘very often the size of the fam-

ily was itself a motivation’’ for residential refurbishment

(see also Phillips, 1993).

A second consequence of changes in the region�s agri-culture of significance to gentrification was that a series

of non-residential properties also became available for

purchase and conversion as many agricultural buildings

became unsuited to housing increasingly large-scaleagricultural machinery. An examination of planning

applications within North Norfolk, for instance, reveals

a range of agriculture and agriculture related buildings

being converted to residential use, including barns,

cowsheds, dairies, stables and mills. Furthermore, the

decline in local services associated with rural depopula-

tion also provided other buildings that might be suit-

able for conversion: hence the planning registers of theDistrict records the conversion of buildings such as

post-offices and shops, public houses, tea-rooms and

hotels, launderies, schools, chapels, workshops and

warehouses. Fourth, whilst disinvesting themselves from

residential and agrarian properties, many landowners

were simultaneously expanding their agricultural land-

holdings, a practice which could significantly restrict

land for new-build development (see Spencer, 1997;Phillips, 2001b) and which in turn could lead to increas-

ing house prices for existing properties.

The degree to which areas underwent such change is

clearly conditioned by a range of factors, including the

precise accumulation strategies of adopted by particular

landowners (see Spencer, 1995, 1997). Furthermore, as

mentioned previously, the timing of change could also

vary considerably, with many of the changes identifiedabove with the period of rural depopulation in the sec-

ond half of the twentieth century occurring earlier in

some localities, and later in others. Such variations

may be significant in determining both the extent and

form of gentrification, issues that will be explored in

the final section of the paper.

4. Making space for rural gentrification: differential

impressions from two Norfolk villages

So far it has been argued that gentrification in rural

Norfolk may be focused in small-scale settlements which

have been relatively immunised from population growth

by past land-holding structures and local authority

development control policies. It has further been arguedthat the geography of rural gentrification may be condi-

tioned by agricultural and tenurial restructurings which

have led to the devalorisation of a range of rural prop-

erties. In the final section of the paper these arguments

are examined through intensive study of two gentrified

villages: Thornage in North Norfolk and Shotesham in

South Norfolk. Both these villages have seen a rise in

the proportion of households which have classifiablevia the Census as �service class�: in 1971 some 20 percent

of Shotesham�s and 25 percent of Thornage�s classed

households fell into the �service class� category, in 1981

the respective percentages were just over 42 and 29 per-

cent, while in 2001 they were 53.6 percent and 41.4

percent. 2

M. Phillips / Geoforum 36 (2005) 477–494 487

These two villages also exhibited many of the features

identified in the preceding analysis of gentrification in

North Norfolk. Both villages are relatively small, both

parishes in which they are situated having a population

density of around 0.4 persons per kilometre in 2001

(OPCS, 2001). Both villages might also be characterisedhistorically as �closed� parishes, although neither was

classified such on the basis of the amount of rented

accommodation recorded in the 1971 Census, which

formed about 51 percent of the properties in Thornage

and 27 percent in Shotesham. However, an examination

of the Valuation Books of the Inland Revenue�s �New

Domesday Survey� of 1910 indicated that in the parish

of Thornage, a Lord Hastings owned some 25 percentof the property in terms of value, while in Shotesham

the dominance by a single landowner was even greater

with over 92 percent of the property in the parish being

owned by a Lord Fellowes, a dominance which was even

higher if the calculations were done in terms of area

owned as opposed to assessed value of property. The

Fellowes family also appeared to have exerted paternal-

istic influence and control in the village: Robert Fello-wes had a new country house built in the village in

1784 and subsequently established a cottage hospital, a

bath house and a �house of industry� in the village, to-

gether with founding the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital

in the city of Norwich (Gunn, 1976). Robert Fellowes�brother was Rector at Shotesham and there clearly

was considerable potential for the Fellowes family to ex-

ert some influence on both the bodies and minds of theresidents of Shotesham.

Spencer (1997, p. 87) argues that in closed paternalis-

tic settlements there was often little attempt to invest in

residential development or in developments which might

diversify local employment opportunities, which led to

people leaving these village in search of employment

or housing. As Fig. 2 shows, the population of Shote-

0

100

200

300

400

500

600

Popu

latio

n/ho

useh

olds

1891

1901

1911

1921

1931

1941

Year

Fig. 2. Population and household change, S

sham declined by over 150 people during the period

1891 to 1921, but sometime after the latter date in-

creased again, such that by 1951 the population was

approximately the same level as it has been at the start

of the century. The trends in population numbers are

broadly mirrored by changes in household numbers,suggesting that the population change does not stem

from change in household structures. The population

turn around of Shotesham does, however, coincide with

a significant transformation in the structure of property

ownership in that in 1919, after the death of Robert Fel-

lows in 1915, a large part of estate property was sold off.

A further sale of property occurred in 1931 and by the

early 1980s the holdings of the Fellowes family had beenreduced to some 2,000 acres, three-quarters of which

was let to others (Webb, 1984). In 1981 some 48 percent

of the residential properties were owner occupied, with

21 percent being rented from the local authority and

some 30 percent held in other ways such as renting from

private landlords (OPCS, 1981). By 1991 the figures

were 73 percent in owner-occupation, 11 percent rented

from the local authority and 15 percent held in otherways, while by 2001 they were 81 percent, 5 percent

and 14 percent respectively (OPCS, 1991; OPCS,

2001). Hence one can clearly see a shift from a closed

structure of property ownership towards a more open

one, as well as the expansion and then decline in local

authority housing provision.

The break-up of the closed property structure coin-

cides with the onset of an expansion in the populationof village and may therefore be seen to lend weight to

the arguments of people such as Spencer who claim that

rural demographics have been significantly influenced by

the structures of property ownership. In particular

Spencer argues that closed property systems in rural set-

tlements tend to entail stagnant or declining population

number, whilst open distributions tend to be associated

1951

1961

1971

1981

1991

2001

Thornage Households

Shotesham Households

Thornage Population

Shotesham Population

hotesham and Thornage, 1891–2001.

3 The interviews were conducted as part of an ESRC Research

Fellowship on �The processes of rural gentrification� (Ref:

H53627500695) which examined rural gentrification in Berkshire,

Leicestershire and Norfolk. See Phillips, 1999b, 2002a,b for more

details.

488 M. Phillips / Geoforum 36 (2005) 477–494

with population increases. However, whilst Shotesham

might appear to fit in well with this model for the period

from 1891 to 1951, thereafter the changes in this village

seem to contradict it in that there appears to be both a

continuing movement towards a more open structure

of property ownership and yet populations level andhousehold numbers first decreased and then, from

1971 onwards, increased again, albeit less strongly in

terms of population numbers. However rather than sug-

gest that property structure plays no role in determining

the demographics of the village, it can be suggested that

the impact of both the �closed� property system of the

early twentieth century and the break-up of this system

over the course of the rest of the twentieth century wasto construct Shotesham as a space suitable for rural gen-

trification to occur in the period from 1970s onwards.

As discussed earlier, one of the ways that villages

might be made ready for gentrification was through

the past structures of property ownership exerting a

continuing influence through the contemporary plan-

ning system with the characteristics of rural space struc-

tured by patterns of landownership. Small villages whichpowerful landowners had long prevented from growing

now became protected by planning systems committed

to preserving the status quo in terms of the pattern of

land-use and settlement. Shotesham has been designated

a Conservation Area since 1973 and the current District

Local Plan establishes a �development boundary� whichhas,

‘‘been drawn up around the existing built-up areato prevent further ribbon developments extendinginto the countryside, much of which is shown asbeing within an Area of High Landscape Quality’’(South Norfolk District Council, 1997, p. 371).

Great stress is placed in the plan on the scale and

physical layout of the village and the aesthetics of this

layout. It is suggested, for instance, that much of the

‘‘character of the village’’ is derived from its ‘‘one plotdepth development’’ (in other words it is a linear vil-

lage), ‘‘the abundance of trees and hedges which fre-

quently fill the significant gaps that separate many of

the villages’’, and the presence of an area of common

land facing much of the linear development of the vil-

lage. The local plan policy is very much to maintain

these features, which although sometimes characterised

in the planning documents as part of a �natural� timelesslandscape, can be seen to stem quite directly from the

closure of property relations in the village. The area of

common land, for example, was a small vestige of a

much larger area of commons enclosed by Robert Fello-

wes in an Enclosure Act of 1781 (Gunn, 1976), while the

scale and density of development was also a reflection of

proprietal dominance exerted by the Fellowes family.

References to the aesthetics of the structure of the vil-lage not only appeared in policy texts, but also figured in

the comments made by some of its residents who were

interviewed by the author. 3 For many residents the

physical structure of the village and the historical char-

acter of particular properties clearly held some appeal

and in some cases seemed to have exerted some motiva-

tional influence on their residential movement into thevillage:

‘‘One of the attractions of the physical appearanceof the village is . . . the fact that there is a largeproportion of old houses . . . there are still somesignificant areas where there is no developmentat all, so there are big gaps between the housesin some areas, and there are a lot of old maturetrees and hedgerows and there are glimpses offields, well more than glimpses, and you haveviews and vantage points, and all of which is whatmakes Shotesham look how it does’’.

‘‘We had always liked . . . [the village] . . . therewas an air of conservation about it with nice oldbuildings, with a rural atmosphere I suppose . . .[Moved because] this house came on the market,we had always liked the look of the house and justhad to go for it because, it does not come on themarket very often, it was just one of those kindhouses’’

There were even some cases where there were quite

direct legitimatory interpretations of the impacts of

landed property:

‘‘Well there hasn�t been any huge estates, and ithadn�t been at that point suburbanised. It hasremained village size/scale. They had the scaleright. The reason why this village was as it was,was because there was a landowner, Fellowes,and he kept control over this village. That�s whyit wasn�t large scale like a lot of the other villages.You generally find that, I think, that when youhave a good land-owner around, the land is pro-tected, the village is protected’’.

Shotesham was not only made as a space for gentrifi-

cation via the legacies of its past as a closed settlement,

but was also made through its transition to a more open

structure of landholding. Three aspects of this transition

can be highlighted. First, at the time of the initial break-

up of the Fellowes estates, a series of small holdings and

cottages with gardens were sold off. The propertiesformed attractive country cottages, while the land and

garden were in several cases sold for in-fill develop-

ments. Second, larger plots of agricultural land were

M. Phillips / Geoforum 36 (2005) 477–494 489

sold off to form a series of owner-occupied farms. Dur-

ing the course of the second half of the twentieth cen-

tury, however, many of these farmers also sold off

parts of their holdings for residential infill develop-

ments. Third, some of the more successful owner-occu-

pier farmers expanded their holdings, purchasing orrenting land from other landowners, and have then

sought to concentrate their use of agricultural proper-

ties. This practice has resulted in the sale of farmhouses,

barns and agricultural outbuildings which had become

devalorised in the movement towards a more capital

intensive and centralised agriculture. An examination

of the planning registers for the village suggests that

while in the 1970s permissions were being sought to en-large and alter agricultural buildings to make them more

suited to a modernising agriculture, or else to change

their use towards a more industrial usage, by the early

1980s there was a rise in applications for conversions

to residential use. The 1980s saw the onset of the conver-

sion of barns for residential usage and by the 1990s there

is evidence of �professional and �hobby gentrifiers� (Phil-lips, 1999b) operating in the area, purchasing propertiesfor conversion and onward sale.

It is possible to further suggest that there may well

have been different agents and types of gentrification

associated with various points in the transformation of

the property structure of the village, closely reminiscent

of those identified in an urban context by Zukin (1990)

(see Table 4), and also in a rural context by Smith and

Phillips (2000). So, for example, while there may havebeen some movement in of new social groups in the first

half of the twentieth century the real period of gentrifi-

cation in Shotesham appears to have commenced in

the early 1970s, following a period of rural depopulation

Table 5

Property relation, demographic change and gentrification phases in Shotesh

Period Property relations Demo

Pre–1919 Closed, patriarchal village Depo

1919–1950s Break-up Fellowes estate; emergence

of owner-occupier farmers and residents

Expan

some

(inclu

1950s–1960s Tightened control on development;

concentration of agricultural development

Contr

Early 1970s Property-owners attempt to convert properties

for new agricultural and industrial uses

Start

1980s Devalorised properties and small parcels of

land sold for residential conversion and new build

Popul

1990s Pressures for development conflict with conservation

values and policies

Increa

and sustained devalorisation of agrarian property and

small, fragmented, land-holdings. At this time there

were a few adventurous, pioneering, households who

purchased properties with an eye to conversion or new

build. However, it is the late 1970s and 1980s that gen-

trification in the village starts to gather pace with agri-cultural land-owners selling off a series of properties

and land-blocks to both incoming households and also,

to an increasing extent, to professional agents of gentri-

fication such as local builders and property companies.

The 1980s and particularly the 1990s saw household

numbers increasing at a faster rate than the population

as a whole, a feature which as noted earlier as been seen

as indicative of gentrified population turnover. By the1990s this professionalism has become even more pro-

nounced, not least because of heightened concerns over

development pressures and the need for any large-scale

piece of gentrification to be designed with conservation

policies clearly in mind. As a result there is considerable

use of agencies such as planning and design consultants,

many of which are located in surrounding villages and

specialise in the refurbishment and construction of ruralgentrified properties (see Table 5).

Turning to Thornage, it has already been shown that

in the early twentieth century Thornage had rather more

open property structure than Shotesham, although one

proprietor, Lord Hastings, still owned about a quarter

of the village by value. Thornage also experienced a

rather different subsequent history of property relation-

ships in that there was no estate break-up in the earlytwentieth century and indeed there is some suggestion

that landowership became more concentrated in the

hands of Hasting family: Harris (1974) described the

villages as having �one absentee landowner, owning

am

graphic character Agents and forms of gentrification

pulation –

sion in population and

new build in village

ding council estate)

In movement of population;

mixed social character

action in population Period of devalorisation of agricultural

and residential properties

of �population turnaround� Few �pioneering� gentrifiers colonisedevalued properties

ation increase Middle class and marginal gentrification

as capital and �sweat-equity� areinvested to realise value of village as

accessible yet rural settlement

sing population Professionalisation of gentrification—

architects, design and planning

consultants employed to work around

conservation requirements;

local property companies, landowners

and �hobby gentrifiers� seek out

gentrifiable properties

Table 6

Property relation, demographic change and gentrification phases in Thornage

Period Property relations Demographic character Agents and forms of gentrification

Early C20th–1950s Closed village Depopulation –

1950s–1970s Increase in �closure� as large landowners

produce �prosperous agriculture� bysubstitute capital for labour

Depopulation Devalorisation of agricultural and

residential properties within the village;

heightened need for capital encourages

further sale of property; some properties

bought and converted

1970s–1980s Devalorisation of service properties as

a result of declining population

Further contraction

in population

Devalorisation of service properties within

the village; some properties bought and converted;

restricted scope for development acts to channel

colonisation towards the retired and

second-home owners

1980s Devalorised properties and small

parcels of land sold for residential

conversion and new build

Increasing population Increasing marginal gentrification major

properties have become gentrified

1990s Pressures for development conflict

with conservation values and policies

Increasing population Massification of gentrification—local

property companies seek to new-build

gentrifiable properties to over-come

shortage of properties

490 M. Phillips / Geoforum 36 (2005) 477–494

virtually all the land, renting it out to two or three ten-

ant farmers�. 4 There was also a steady decline in the

population of the village after 1901 (see Fig. 2), and in-

deed the parish figured as one of the areas exhibiting

greatest levels of depopulation in the 1960s in Drudy

(1978). As outlined earlier, Drudy attributes the depop-ulation of North Norfolk primarily to the substitution

of capital for labour, and a resultant fall in the agricul-

tural labour force, and Harris� (1974) study of Thornage

suggests that by the early 1970s few people in the village

worked in agriculture, although some worked in agricul-

tural service industries. Furthermore, it appears that the

Hasting�s estate sold off many of its village holdings (the

proportion of privately rented accommodation recordedin the Census dropped dramatically from 51 percent in

1971 to 16 percent by 1981), at the same time as expand-

ing its ownership of the surrounding agricultural land,

actions which conform to the arguments of people such

as Bettley-Smith and Bowler and Lewis discussed

previously.

The situation in Thornage seems to closely parallel

that observed by Spencer (1997) in theOxfordshire villageof Stoke Talmage whereby the estate owner�s policy of

partial disinvestment was focused on village residential

properties, one consequence of whichwas that no agricul-

tural land was released for additional housing. Indeed,

this selling up of property may well have displaced some

residents who were unable to find the money to purchase

properties and led initially to property abandonment with

the number of resident households falling in the 1960s and1970s (see Fig. 2). The village also evidently lost several

4 Harris uses a pseudonym for his village study, but as outlined in

Phillips (forthcoming-b), it was very evidently Thornage.

services at this time: Harris (1974, p. 1) talks of the village

having a shop, cumpost-office and off-licence, a dairy and

‘‘a flourishing garage cum contracting business’’,

although the village had already evidently lost a public

house and blacksmith foundry. Today the village has

none of these services.The actions of the Hastings estate, and parallel ac-

tions by other landowners, can be seen to have had five

types of consequence which were of significance in later

transforming the village into a space of gentrification.

First, the housing sold by the estate was in several cases

bought by �middle class� incomers, many of whom are

now seen by themselves and others as long established

members of the village. Second, a series of non-residen-tial properties also became available for purchase and

conversion. From the mid 1980s it appears, for example,

that a series of farmhouses, barns and agricultural build-

ings quite centrally located in the village were vacated

and then converted into residential use (see Phillips,

2001b). Third, the decline in local services provided fur-

ther buildings suitable for conversion: the village post-

office and shop, the village pub, and blacksmith�s forgehave all been converted into residential properties, while

the site of the garage used to construct a series of new

residential properties. Fourth, the expansion in agricul-

tural land-holdings outside the village restricted land for

new-build development, which in turn led to increasing

prices for existing residential properties and rising values

for potentially convertible properties. New build devel-

opments in Thornage have been significantly less thanin Shotesham over the period from the 1970s, and even

very small outbuildings have been converted into resi-

dential properties. Fifth, restricted land availability has

also thwarted various attempts to develop communal

facilities, which arguably has made the village less

attractive for people with children or those who wish

M. Phillips / Geoforum 36 (2005) 477–494 491

to �move-in and join-in� (Cloke et al., 1995, 1998; Phil-

lips, 2001a) by participating in some communal activi-

ties. By contrast, Shotesham has a much more open

spatial form which has proved very popular to incomers

with families, despite the loss of its school. Thornage has

proved much more popular with the retired and second-home owners who appear to value it for its quietness.

There has also been continued pressure for new-build,

particularly from local building companies seeking sites

for estate type constructs, although the only scheme so

far approved has been on the old garage site with houses

which closely conform in style to previously gentrified

properties. Hence, as in Shotesham, there have been a

range of agencies associated with the gentrification ofthe village as different times (see Table 6).

5. Conclusions

This paper has focused attention on the making of

space for rural gentrification, both discursively and

materially. With regard to the former, the paper hasemphasised the differential constructions of rural and

urban gentrification, whereby the latter is more widely,

more complexly and more divergently constructed than

the latter. The paper has sought to draw on notions of

gentrification as residential refurbishment and develop-

ment through capital investment and associated social

displacement, ideas present in early constructs of urban

gentrification change, the more recent arguments of so-called �production-side� theorists of gentrification such

as Smith and some studies of rural gentrification. It is

argued in this paper that these ideas also have some as

commensurablity with other areas of rural research,

including some notions of �post-productivist country-

side�, and also with some arguments relating rural demo-

graphic change with planning and property relations.

Using these ideas, the paper has focused on the gentri-fication of rural Norfolk. It is argued that contemporary

actions to gentrify rural spaces may well occur in material

contexts which are conditioned in part by legacies of past

actions and relations. In particular, the paper explores

arguments which suggest that past structures of land-

ownership exert a continuing influence through the

land-use planning system, and that this system in turn

conditions the geography of rural gentrification. Supportfor this argument is found through an analysis of popula-

tion and household change, tenure structure and settle-

ment classification, and also through a more intensive

study of gentrification in two Norfolk villages. This more

intensive study revealed how in both villages land and

properties which are now valued for gentrification had

previously become devalued for agricultural and service

capital, and how a range of agents of gentrification hadbecome implicated, at different points in time, in their

reconstruction for gentrification. The intensive study also

raises some questions about the use of surrogate mea-

sures of landownership such as size of the private rented

sector as recorded in the 1971 Census. Whilst classified as

�open� parishes on the surrogate measure, it is suggested

that both study villages had a �closed� structure of land-ownership at the close of the nineteenth century. Thisshows clearly both the value of in-depth study based on

direct and more contemporaneous sources, such as the

Lloyd George�s 1910 �Domesday� survey, although the

strength of the apparent relationship between population

change, tenurial structure and planning settlement classi-

fication is suggestive that the surrogate measures may be

of indicative if not absolute value.

The intensive analysis also showed that rural spacescan be made ready for gentrification in quite different

ways. In the case of Shotesham, for example, the pres-

ence and then rapid break-up of a closed property sys-

tem was of central significance in the making of the

village as a gentrifiable space, whilst in Thornage land-

ownership remained �closed� but residential, agriculturaland service properties were sold-off to allow for capital

intensification within agriculture. Both villages werenot only made ready for gentrification in slightly differ-

ent ways, but were made ready at differing timings and

though differing sets of agencies. They were, as a conse-

quence, also made as slightly different spaces: Shote-

sham, for example, was made in a way which appealed

to those desiring a �community idyll�, whereas Thor-

nage�s attractions appear to lie more within a peaceful

pastoral. This is not to say that everybody in these gen-trified spaces adheres completely to these desires—there

is plenty of contestation over the current and future con-

struction of these spaces (see Phillips, 2001b)—nor that

the processes of gentrification outlined here account for

all the differences between the villages. Other influences

include the differential positioning of the two villages in

relation to Norwich and to coastal tourist attractions.

Furthermore, the making of these gentrified spaces isfar from over. Not only is there continued turn-over

of population within existing residential properties and

further plans for conversion and residential new-build,

but there have also been retail and leisure investments

in the areas surrounding both villages, investments

which might be seen to constitute the emergence of re-

gional gentrification �socio-spatial complexes� wherebyareas take on a symbolic identity of a gentrified spacewhich in turn becomes a commodity for recreational, re-

tail and finance capital.

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