When I completed Up In Smoke, my history of Battersea Power Station, in early 2016, the power station was still a derelict shell in the centre of a huge building site. Some believed it would always remain so. But in October 2022 the power station finally opened to the public after almost 40 years of failed dreams.
The new paperback edition brings this story up to date. It is still the only complete history of the power station from its inception and decades of electricity generation through the long years of abandon when successive developers tried to remake Battersea for the modern age. It includes interviews with people who worked at the power station in the 50s and 60s, plus the developers, architects and planners who worked on the many schemes that followed closure. There’s also a chapter about Pink Floyd’s flyaway pig.
Revised throughout with a new final chapter containing fresh interviews and insights about the completed development, we felt this needed a new cover and title. It is now called White Elephants And Flying Pigs: The Extraordinary Afterlife Of Battersea Power Station and is available through Paradise Road.
The Great Wen 