Many years ago, I stood in a field and watched, on a bright, clear morning one of east Kent’s most iconic industrial landmarks come crashing to the ground.

The cooling towers of Richborough Power Station, near Sandwich, were far from beautiful. In fact they stood out like something of a sore thumb among the green fields which rolled down towards the area’s curving coastline.

Yet more than a few tears were shed by the thousands who gathered from miles around to watch these monoliths be reduced to rubble.

Why? Because although it was hard to grow attached to them, per se, they represented, to many the end of a journey; a sign they were home.

These cold, grey towers became a landmark; instantly recognisable for miles around.

They anchored people and so when they fell – as part of a controlled explosion – many felt adrift.

And this is what our industrial buildings can do. They’re rarely pretty, they’re frequently products of a relatively modern era, but they do become part of the tapestry of a community.

Take the gas holders which once towered over London’s The Oval cricket ground. Loved or loathed, they defined that sporting palace in a way no new stand really ever could. They became part of its fabric – a neighbouring urban necessity which wed itself to the local area.

So significant were the holders, when the gas works on which they were sat were earmarked for development (swanky apartments, as if you couldn’t guess) one complex will actually be built within the instantly recognisable metal framework as a nod to its past.

When I was young, and living in Tunbridge Wells, I used to be fascinated by the gas holders near High Brooms railway station. As I’d wait for my father to return home from work, each day they would rise and fall depending on how much gas was contained within.

It was, frankly, a ugly mesh of metal, but it became part of the landscape – and remains in my mind’s eye when I think back to my childhood.

If you’ve ever been near Dungeness when the mist is rolling in over its shingle shores, there are fewer odder places to behold than the sprawling nuclear power station there.

As operations there are wound down, the building itself has become absolutely synonymous with the area.

So while, for many, industrial buildings are a blot on the landscape, for many others they become an intrinsic part of where we live, work and play.

As much as we would all love to live in a county where everything is aesthetically pleasing to everyone’s eye, these industrial sites should not always be scorned upon or campaigned against. Beauty, after all, is more than skin deep.