walk/tour
The Market Place, Brentford, TW8 8FJ
The A4 Great West Road is 100-years-old in 2025. In 1933 J. B. Priestley wrote that: "Being new, the Great West Road did not look English. We might have suddenly rolled into California." Participants will see some of what remains of this unique corridor of Art Deco architecture and hear about some of the, famous, lost buildings of the inter war era.
Boston Manor
Brentford
235, 237, 267, E8
Walking tour to end at Gillette Corner TW7 5LW. Participants may return to Brentford Market Place with the guide or disperse as preferred.
Walking on paths but unsuitable forwheelchair users due to a flight of steps, from the canal towpath, up the bank to the A4 Great West Road.
Traffic noise along the A4 can be a problem. The guide is a practiced outdoor speaker. Pavements may be shared with cyclists, leave room.
Walking tour
14:30–16:00
From Brentford's Market Place to Gillette Corner via the Grand Union Canal and the Great West Road. (Includes steps up from the canal).
How to book
Please create a free visitor account to book your festival tickets.
When JB Priestley set out on his English Journey, on a motor coach from Victoria Coach Station, in 1933, he wrote of the Great West Road that:
"Being new, it did not look English, we might suddenly have rolled into California."
It is now one hundred years since King George V opened the Great West Road. Some of the Art Deco era buildings that JB Priestley thought "seemed to be merely playing at being factories" are now listed as part of our architectural heritage. Others are now lost, sometimes in notorious circumstances. Hear about the history of this well-known arterial road from a Local Historian who has written a recent and well-received book on Brentford's by-pass road.
