Control Tower

Control tower, constructed 1939–40 for the Air Ministry's Directorate of Works as a Watch Office with Meteorological Section. The design (Drawing no. 5845/39) features painted brickwork walls, reinforced concrete floors and roof with asphalt finish.

The building has a near-square plan across three floors, with wide glazed balconies facing the flying field. The ground floor accommodates the main watch office, pilots' room, forecast and teleprinter areas, and WCs. The first floor contains the main control room, backed by the meteorological and signals offices. A rear staircase provides access to a glazed observation room at second floor level.

The exterior retains its original steel casements with horizontal glazing bars throughout, including those serving the long observation frontages. At ground floor, the front elevation comprises three large 4-light windows separated by brick piers, beneath a cantilevered concrete balcony with semi-circular ends and a 'nautical' style steel balustrade of four horizontal bars with simple uprights. A continuous multi-light window at this level returns to quadrants at each end, above a low breast wall, with a deep parapet wall rising as a balustrade to the top deck. The top deck features full-width glazing to a set-back observation room. The return walls contain a series of tall casements, linked at the upper level by a frieze band beneath the cantilevered flat slab, with the nautical balustrade continued to the rear stair tower. The rear façade has single lights either side of the projecting stair tower, with a small bull's-eye above a deep stair light, and small lights on the return. Two flanking structures—fire tender and flare stores of two and three bays respectively—abut each side.

Later alterations include a timber-framed and glazed observation room and an extension over the rear doorway. The interior retains original doors and joinery, and features a solid concrete staircase.

This control tower represents the most sophisticated Air Ministry design of the inter-war period, exemplified by its integration of a meteorological section into the planning behind the control room and its distinctly Art Deco treatment, which recalls the Bauhaus tradition. It is the finest example of its type after Swanton Morley. The evolution of control towers reflects the aeronautical and military developments of the 1930s: growing concern for aircraft dispersal and shelter, the development of radio communication, and the need to organise flying fields into zones for take-off, landing, and taxiing. Control towers evolved from the simple watch office of the 1920s to the integrated traffic control and weather monitoring design exemplified here, becoming the most distinctive and instantly recognisable building on military airfields, particularly during the Second World War.

West Malling was originally used by the Maidstone School of Flying from 1930 as a private landing ground, registered as Maidstone airport in 1932. It became a fighter station satellite of Biggin Hill within 11 Group in June 1940. Following raids in August and September 1940 that rendered the airfield unserviceable during the Battle of Britain, it reopened in October 1940 and achieved full operational status in April 1941. As a nightfighter station, it was home to Bristol Beaufighter pilots including Guy Gibson and Don Parker, who later became prominent figures in Bomber Command—Gibson for his leadership of 617 Squadron in the Dams Raid and other precision attacks. The station subsequently operated Mosquitos and Typhoons in operations against occupied Europe, including support for D-Day operations. It became the principal station during Operation Diver in 1944, the defence campaign against V1 bomb attacks on the east and south-eastern coasts. Significantly, West Malling is the only fighter station associated with Operation Diver to have survived in sufficiently complete condition to merit listing; the other key sites in the London area—Northolt, Biggin Hill, and Kenley—were positioned behind the balloon barrage erected for the operation.

After the war, West Malling served as the main rehabilitation centre for prisoners of war returning from Germany. The base entered 'care and maintenance' in August 1960 and was acquired by Kent County Council in 1970. It became a centre for dispossessed Ugandan Asians in 1972, with major buildings including the Officers' Mess and Building 60 subsequently adapted for local authority use, while others were incorporated into a larger commercial park.