Milton Keynes

It's built for cars. The buses are baffling. But it's got the most energy efficient housing in Britain. What did it take to build a city from almost nothing? And a university where there are no students on campus? 

With architectural historian John Grindrod, Ros Taylor tells the story of Milton Keynes and the Open University.

With thanks to John Grindrod, the author of Iconicon, Concretopia and Outskirts and the presenter of Monstrosities Mon Amour. His forthcoming book, Tales of the Suburbs, on LGBTQ people in suburbia, is out in February 2026.

Seth Thévoz read Lords speeches by Baron Richard Mitchison and Lord Gerald Gardiner, both in Hansard.

Milton Keynes: Shopping as it Should Be and an ITN report from 1967 are available on YouTube. Clips of Harold Wilson and Jennie Lee are at the Open University Digital Archive, which explains the OU's founding. This was an invaluable source of OU history. I also drew on the vast resources at the Milton Keynes Living Archive and the original Plan for Milton Keynes.