Building Design articles from April 2003

Building Design archives from April 2003

Cabe offers Shard lifeline: Final, pre-inquiry negotiations with London Bridge tower developer could smooth path for Prescott go-ahead.
April 4, 2003... One of the key opponents of Renzo Piano's London Bridge tower could be wavering in its opposition to the dramatic, 300m-high office development in a move that may pave the way for the controversial scheme's approval. In last-ditch,...

TP Bennett Architects.(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... TP Bennett Architects has submitted for planninq permission its designs for a 22-storey mixed-use development on the banks of the Thames in north Woolwich. The building will create 8,500sq m of residential accommodation and includes a cafe and...

Stars offer room service in Madrid.(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... A Spanish hotelier has recruited a clutch of top names in modem British architecture to design a series of signature interiors for a new Madrid hotel, BD can exclusively reveal. Guests at the hotel will be able to choose from rooms designed...

Libeskind vows integrity: World Trade Centre site architect promises to protect his design from ideological appropriation. (News).
April 4, 2003... Ground zero architect Daniel Libeskind told a London audience this week that he was determined to protect his Manhattan scheme from being appropriated by the US "far right". Responding to suggestions that it could becomes an "excercise in...

Van Heyningen & Haward Architects. (News).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... Caption: Van Heyningen & Haward Architects has been chosen to design the new Children & Young People's Centre in Catford, southeast London. It beat Edward Cullinan Architects, Eger Architects and Penoyre & Prasad.

Architect has time on his side. (News).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... An architect who allegedly withdrew money from his client's account and created such a poor design that the works had to be demolished escaped discipline by Arb because too much time had elapsed since the incident. The case against Gavin...

Arb drops names. (News).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... Arb has vowed to delete as many as 400 architects from its register of 30,000 architects because they have not responded to its call for confirmation of an existing business address. The cull of members from the official register of architects...

Paddington on hold. (News).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... The second phase of Sidell Gibson Partnership's mixed-use scheme at Paddington, west London has been put on hold by developer Development Securities because of uncertain market conditions. It would have included designs by KPF and Sheppard...

Alsop turns sculptor on Goldsmiths design. (News).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... Alsop Architects' detailed design for the new arts complex at Goldsmiths College, south-east London, was submitted for planning permission last week, complete with a 9m-high Alsop sculpture. Images of the proposed scheme could not be...

Telford setbacks. (News).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... The competition to select an architect for the East Ketley millennium community in Telford has been delayed three times because of "internal problems at English Partnerships", according to a source close to the competition. David Lock...

New bidders for Tobacco Warehouse. (News).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... English Partnerships and ING both emerged as bidders this week to develop Liverpool's historic 13-storey Tobacco Warehouse amid calls from the local architectural community for more imaginative bids to come forward. EP and banking firm ING...

Culture Capital bids pin hopes on design. (News).
April 4, 2003... Six cities began the final leg of the race to become European Capital of Culture 2008 this week, unveiling plans for over [pounds sterling]20 billion of new buildings and urban improvements. Bid teams in Oxford, Liverpool, Cardiff,...

Sikh temple could go to US. (News).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... A new [pounds sterling]17.5 million Sikh gurd-wara opened in Southall, west London, on Sunday, and the designer is in talks to produce two more in the US. The clients for the 6,000sq m temple, a committee of prominent Sikhs in the area,...

Davidson to be memorialised. (News).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... The late architect Ian Davidson is set to be memorialised in two of his final projects in central London and Reading. A commercial project in Covent Garden, being developed by Derwent Valley, will be named The Davidson Building, while...

Ski jumping is set to reach new heights with the construction, by m2r-architecture. (News).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... Caption: Ski jumping is set to reach new heights with the construction, by m2r-architecture, of the world's first cantilevered jump in the Vogtland region of east Germany. Expected to be in place for the 2004 World Cup ski season, the [pounds...

Low fee fears hit competition: Sheppard Robson's UCE commission sparks fears of fee rivalry. (News).
April 4, 2003... Sheppard Robson has won a [pounds sterling]30 million commission in the Eastside area of Birmingham in a competition that has sparked fears of growing rivalry on fees. The firm heat John McAslan & Partners, David Morley Architeds and...

Future of West Pier uncertain. (News).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... The future of Brighton's grade I listed West Pier was hanging in the balance this week, following a blaze that damaged its pavilion and dance hall a week ago. While architect KSS Sport & Leisure Design said that the fire -- already being...

US left off Beijing shortlist. (News).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... Two US practices have failed to reach the final shortlist for the Beijing Olympic Stadium amid suspicion that their omission was politically motivated, BD has learnt. While the US losers Ellerbe Becket and NBBJ were licking their wounds,...

BDP Landscape has won an international competition. (News).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... Caption: BDP Landscape has won an international competition to redesign a former shipyard on a 2km stretch of Mediterranean coastline near Toulon, France. The scheme includes a new urban park and possible sites for a theatre, hotel and casino....

UK expat architects hit by US slowdown. (News).
April 4, 2003... British architects are finding it harder to work in the US as the economic slowdown forces practices to employ US architects only, or to demand that expatriates become US registered. Designers already working at US practices are feeling...

Long & Kentish to design Jewish Museum scheme. (News).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... Long & Kentish has won a competition to triple the size of the Jewish Museum in Camden, north London, beating competition from a shortlist of Dixon Jones, Purcell Miller Tritton, Hugh Broughton Architects, Rozerman Farlie Kuypers and Thomas...

Munckenbeck & Marshall's refurbishment and extension of Gainsborough Studios in Hackney. (News).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... Caption: Munckenbeck & Marshall's refurbishment and extension (pictured) of Gainsborough Studios in Hackney, east London, into a 251-apartment development is nearing completion. The warehouse was once a thriving film studio, where Alfred...

EH finds conservation officers overstretched: survey shows councils' under-resourcing is jeopardising historic environment. (News).
April 4, 2003... Conservation officers in local authorities are under-resourced, undervalued and overworked leading to extensive delays for architects working on heritage projects, according to English Heritage research. The survey has found that each of...

Nature's influence at V&A. (News).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... Architecture inspired by the natural world will be the subject of Zoomorphic, an exhibition at London's Victoria & Albert Museum this autumn. Designed by Make, the show will display architectural models alongside skeletons and stuffed...

Foster takes home [pounds sterling]6m despite dip in profits. (News).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... Norman Foster still managed to pick up a wacking annual pay cheque of [pounds sterling]6.1 million in the 2001-02 financial year, despite his practice being hit by a dip in pre-tax profits. As predicted by BD last October, Foster &...

The topping out ceremony of Foster & Partners' [pounds sterling]26 million Tanaka Business School at Imperial College. (News).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... Caption: The topping out ceremony of Foster & Partners' [pounds sterling]26 million Tanaka Business School at Imperial College, London, took place on Wednesday. The project marks a continuation of Fosters' masterplan at the site, and the...

Can Cabe cure white elephant fever? (Analysis & Comment).
April 4, 2003... The silly and the serious emerged together this week to illuminate this country's divided attitude to architecture. From Bristol to Liverpool extravagant schemes, many of which stand no chance of being built, were paraded in bids to become the...

Letters.
April 4, 2003... Rebuilding shame From Sam Webb, Chartham, Kent Invitations from the British Consultants & Construction Bureau to British construction firms to tender for the rebuilding in Iraq may not be just a little premature, they are obscene. ...

Timespam.(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... 1993 A new generation combines engineering skill and architectural vision. 2003 How Baghdad looks to US entrepreneurs (reconstruction). 2013 Gaudi's DNA revealed. 'Browser'

Design rules: we are paying a heavy price for seeing design as creative and engineering as stolid. Equality is the only way forward. (Comment & Analysis).
April 4, 2003... It's a demographic thing. Young people are still applying for places at schools of architecture and design in substantial numbers while in recent years they have not been doing so for degrees in structural or services engineering nor for...

Rewind and repeat: last week BD argued that to reinvigorate our cities, architects need to move from bespoke design to repetition. Here Alex Lifschutz responds. (Comment & Analysis).
April 4, 2003... Robert Booth, in his leader last week, was right to warn that problems in obtaining insurance are symptoms, not causes, of a more widespread malaise in architecture and urban planning. Our knowledge and understanding of cities seems Less...

Danny from the block. (Concrete Boots).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... Ground zero architect Daniel Libeskind complained this week that he was still treated as a foreigner in America. Retold a London audience at his lecture that one of the first questions he was asked after his appointment on the New York scheme...

Groovy, man. (Concrete Boots).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... The bids for the City of Culture 2008 from Birmingham, Oxford, Liverpool, Newcastle/Gateshead, Cardiff and Bristol contain some weird and wonderful proposals. Newcastle/Gateshead's bid is called "Newcastle/Gateshead Buzzin", which sounds like...

Counting their piles. (Concrete Boots).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... Norris McWhirter may well be sent running to his record books by news of Norman Foster's [pounds sterling]6.1 million pay packet last year. But Norman isn't the only man in the construction business vying for a place. Foundation engineer Roger...

Widow scorned. (Concrete Boots).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... More rumblings around the Scottish parliament project Enric Miralles' widow Benedetta Tagliabue is upset that she is losing control of the furniture and fittings. She is quoted in the Scotsman as saying she has been left out of the...

Any colour you like. (Concrete Boots).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... Competition is hotting up to keep the most lucrative corporate clients, so CB brings you a tip from the top. The practice now known as Grimshaw has a sleek conference suite complete with colour-changing light wall. Why? Well you can bathe the...

Speedy recovery: UN Habitat already has plans in place for Iraq once the conflict is over. (Comment and Analysis).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... When United Nations Habitat starts work on rehousing thousands of displaced Iraqis after the war, it will do so from a position of experience. The leading UN agency for providing shelter and for reconstruction in many parts of the world,...

Note of discord: Renzo Piano's London Bridge Tower should be the kind of superstar design that helps promote Cabe's message on quality architecture-so why might it still oppose it? (Comment & Analysis).
April 4, 2003... Cabe was set up with a remit to promote good architecture. So why, in just over a week's time, might the architecture watchdog's deputy chairman Paul Finch line up alongside the tweed-jacketed conservation lobby to oppose plans for the first UK...

Performance piece: designed to express the building's dance activity, details of the Scottish School of Contemporary Dance, by Nicoll Russell Studios, verge on the superfluous, but its spaces are invigorating. (Nicoll Russell Studios, Dundee).
April 4, 2003... New buildings for the arts have come in waves over the last few years, with purpose-built facilities for dance the latest to emerge -- Herzog & de Meuron's much-heralded Laban Centre in Deptford, south-east London; Dance Base in Edinburgh by...

On the waterfront: A radical landscaping scheme by Grant Associates could be the key to the development of the New Islington masterplan, which aims to solve the problems of Manchester's troubled Cardroom estate. (Landscaping).
April 4, 2003... Swampy undergrowth flowing beneath elevated timber-clad buildings. Surely this is a scene typical of the humid wetlands of the Far East, not central Manchester? But the residential "urban barns" (shown above), designed by Alsop Architects, with...

Awaiting bloom: Cabe Space is about to start its clean up of England's neglected open spaces. Here Amanda Birch discovers how a project in similar circumstances has already succeeded.
April 4, 2003... With the launch of Cabe Space next month, England's blighted open spaces may finally be getting the long-overdue attention they deserve. First announced at last autumn's Urban Summit, Cabe Space is the new unit dedicated to promoting...

Breaking down the barriers: Liz Hoggard visits a retrospective of New York practice Diller & Scofidio's work, which combines architecture with video work and performance art. (Culture).
April 4, 2003... A robotic drill is attacking the pristine white walls of the gallery, leaving a random trail of holes. Meanwhile, visitors cluster around Master/Slave--a glasswalled, Mies van der Rohe-style vitrine--where Japanese robots travel up and down a...

Common wealth: Public space is the subject of a new exhibition at the Lighthouse in Glasgow.
April 4, 2003... A number of astute architectural theorists have recently promulgated the notion of the everyday. the ordinary. However, the term "common" is still usually employed in the pejorative sense of something being unsophisticated, vulgar or crude....

New Environmental Guide from Marley & Eternit. (Showcase).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... Marley Roofing Products and Eternit Slates have recently published an Environmental Guide on sustainable roofing systems, The 12 page brochure examines Government legislation in the context of key issues confronting the construction industry....

Showerlux promotion puts spring in the step of Sigma sales. (Showcase).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... Leading bathroom specialist showerlux is offering retailers the chance to make the most of their shower enclosure sales this Spring with a free shower tray promotion. For each Sigma showeround enclosure ordered between 1st April and 30th...

NEW Midilift brochure - from Stannah. (Showcase).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... A new 'one stop shop' vertical platform lift brochure is now available from Stannah Lifts. The Stannah Midilift range provides simple solutions to access for disabled people, from just a few steps up to a 6.5 metre travel. Every lift is...

D-Vision doors for London hotel. (Showcase).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... Performance flush doors and doorsets from leading manufacturing LS Leaderflush Shapland have played an important role in the recent upgrading of a London hotel. Some 70 doors and doorsets were supplied to the Abcone Hotel close to Kensington's...

GA Impressional - keeping its cool at The Foundry Niteclub. (Showcase).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... A sensational makeover has taken place at The Foundry Niteclub, Carlow Ireland - where Gooding Aluminium's stunning, innovative range of Impressional decorative cladding panels have been given star billing in creating the coolest hotspot in...

Heat pipes improve Middle East air conditioning. (Showcase).(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... S & P Coil Products have opened a permanent office in Dubai, as the rapidly growing use of heat pipes in air conditioning units has virtually doubled their business in the Middle East in 12 months. SPC's patented heat pipes - which...

Playing dumb. (Back Space).
April 4, 2003... The recent increase in the general public's interest in architecture has not gone unnoticed among architects, and no doubt such a thing should be welcomed. But how often is it that when subjected to increased public interest, "difficult"...

Ian Martin.
April 4, 2003... Monday Just who do those pantalooned clowns at English Heritage think they are? Seven hundred conservation officers, yet they're complaining that their caseload is too heavy. What are they -- social workers? We should stand firm and reject...

Diary.(Brief Article)
April 4, 2003... LECTURES MONDAY * Niall McLaughlin. Venue Chester College, Parkgate Road, Chester. 7.30pm. Cost Free. Details 0161 237 5566. * Florian Beigel. Venue Department of Architecture & Spatial Design, London...

BBC eyes up radical quintet.(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... The BBC has announced a controversial shortlist for its symphony orchestra's new [pounds sterling]50 million home, which will deliver the biggest ever British job to either Foreign Office Architects, Future Systems, Ushida Findlay, Zaha Hadid...

Egan back on the case: former construction tsar appointed to oversee skills review.(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... The controversial former construction tsar John Egan has made a surprise comeback to the industry this week after deputy prime minister John Prescott appointed him to oversee a major review of the skills needed to deliver 200,000 new homes. ...

EH's sacrifice to save skyline: move to give up two thirds of views to save remainder. (News).(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... English Heritage is proposing to give up nearly two thirds of its control over the capital's skyline in a bid to save the remaining third from tall building development envisaged by mayor Ken Livingstone's London Plan. The surprise move...

Piano adds 'spiritual' space to top of tower. (News).(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... Londoners could be given a quiet space for contemplation 300m above the capital after Renzo Piano agreed to local MP Simon Hughes's call for his proposed London Bridge Tower to include a "spiritual" space. The space, described by leader of...

Brown cracks down on local planners. (News).(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... Chancellor Gordon Brown announced "further significant changes" to the planning system this week as he tightened his grip on a regime that he believes is holding back economic and housing growth in the UK. In a budget that once again...

Relocation, relocation. (News).(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... The practice behind the Micro Flat is setting up in Manchester to take advantage of the wave of regeneration projects in the north. Piercy Conner Architects & Designers, shortlisted for this year's BD/Corus Young Architect of the Year Award, is...

Canal dreams. (News).(Manchester housing project)(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... Following the launch of Alsop Architects' plan for Manchester's Millennium Community, expressions of interest are invited for the design of the first development of social housing in the city's New Islington district. Led by Urban Splash, a...

Stockport winner. (News).(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... James Holyoak, a landscape architect from Birmingham, has won an RIBA open competition to design an urban vision for Stockport town centre. Judges Jason Prior of EDAW and John Lyall chose the winner from 68 entries. Second prize went to...

Cash for drawings. (News).(new museum space)(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... The future of Architecture for All, a scheme mounted by the RIBA and the Victoria & Albert Museum, is assured following the announcement by the Heritage Lottery Fund that it will award a grant of [pounds sterling]3.7 million to the project. The...

De La Warr go ahead. (News).(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... Refurbishment work on the grade 1 listed De La Warr Pavilion in Bexhill-on-Sea will start in July, with architect John McAslan & Partners at the helm. The amenity will become a contemporary art & architecture centre combined with facilities for...

Trowbridge re-vision. (News).(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... Gillespies Urban Design has been appointed vision consultant for the regeneration of Trowbridge, Shropshire. The firm will lead a team of 20 experts carrying out a range of technical work to produce an overall masterplan. The team will examine...

Report slams method of holyrood payment. (News).(irregularities claimed in official study of payment to architects)
April 11, 2003... The payment of design fees to the architects of the Scottish parliament building in Edinburgh came under close scrutiny this week with the leak of an official study claiming irregularities. The report, by consultant Gardiner & Theobold for...

Architects vs scientists on University Challenge. (News).(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... A team of architects swapped starter homes for starters for 10 when they took part in University Challenge for professionals to be screened next week. Bristling with confidence after trouncing their Royal Society opponents in the warm-up...

EH ramp niggles may force town hall sale. (News).
April 11, 2003... The leader of a London borough has threatened to turn a neo-classical grade II listed town hall into private housing after English Heritage poured cold water on proposals to put a disability ramp at the entrance. Southwark Borough Council,...

Utzon takes Pritzker. (News).(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... Jorn Utzon, designer of the Sydney Opera House, has been awarded the coveted Pritzker Architecture Prize for a lifetime of achievement. Utzon, 84, is in frail health, and will not be fit enough to receive the prize in Madrid next month....

Mather wins Virginia job. (News).(Rick Mather Architects)(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... Rick Mather Architects unveiled its plans for a US $100 million ([pounds sterling]64 million) overhaul of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. The job in the state capital, Richmond, is the practice's largest yet and will see it try again to...

Rogers in fresh spat with Welsh Assembly. (News).
April 11, 2003... Richard Rogers has been accused of "intimidation" in a fresh spat with the National Assembly for Wales. The embarrassing bust-up shows that relations between Rogers and the Welsh government are still fractious, even though Richard Rogers...

As Brighton scheme fails quality threshold. (News).(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... Richard Rogers Partnership's shortlisted design for a sports centre and flats on the Hove sea front in East Sussex has been thrown out for not matching the standard of its two competitors. RRP's scheme with S&P architects to redevelop the...

UK woman designs Afghan baby clinic. (News).(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... A new maternity building designed by a British architect in Afghanistan's capital Kabul is set to become one of the first UK designs to be built in the city since the US military campaign a year and a half ago. Carinne Lawrence, a...

Cabe appoints Thrift. (News).(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... Julia Thrift has been appointed director of Cabe Space, Cabe's new unit that will champion the standards of parks and urban green spaces. Thrift, currently head of programmes at the Civic Trust, has experience of public space issues through her...

High-quality pledge. (News).(housing industry sets new standards)(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... This week the housing industry launched a manifesto of commitment to high-quality schemes that aim to enhance local character. The document comes in the wake of the government's sustainable communities plan. The initiative, called Building for...

[pounds sterling]3m damages claim: Bristol practice taken to court after Plymouth Co-op HQ goes over budget. (News).
April 11, 2003... A Bristol-based practice preparing for voluntary liquidation is being taken to court for nearly [pound sterling]3 million in damages by a former client after a refurbishment job went over budget. The Plymouth & South West Co-operative...

Scots design watchdog faces fresh call to reform. (News).(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... The Royal Incorporation of Architects in Scotland has called for the Royal Fine Art Commission for Scotland to modernise and become more like England's Commission for Architecture & the Built Environment. A report from the RIAS council...

We must persuade Egan of our worth. (Analysis & Comment).
April 11, 2003... Labour's appointment of John Egan to analyse the professions will cause alarm among some architects. The relationship with Egan's previous vehicle for reform, Rethinking Construction, was and still is tense. This was backed squarely by the...

Letters.(Letter to the Editor)
April 11, 2003... Dual in the crown From Peter Gibbs-Kennet, Bisley, Gloucestershire Richard Saxon, in identifying the value of dual-qualified architect-engineers (Comment & Analysis April 4), suggests that "integration through architectural entry is an...

Timespam. (Analysis & Comment).(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... 1943 Most female architects work from home. 2003 Small practice Guide To Getting Work published. 2043 Old Europe/New Europe bridge-building complete. 'Browser'

Volume balance: good design in ordinary housing has at last brought us back to work with volume house builders. (Comment & Analysis).
April 11, 2003... There's no better way for architects to increase their workload than to engage with volume housebuilders. In Edinburgh there's been a seminar and a conference recently exploring the coming together of architects and housebuilders. The prize is...

Two jags gibberish. (Concrete Boots).(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... Deputy prime minister John Prescott was on top form this week announcing a series of new measures for the Communities Plan and at one point getting very passionate about canals. He even coined a couple of cracking new Prescottisms, saying the...

Scare tactics. (Concrete Boots).(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... But perhaps the biggest Prescottism of all is the grammatically perfect, but perfectly meaningless term "sustainable communities". The great and the good of the housing and design sector wrestled with what on earth this means for the rest of...

A pearl in Dean. (Concrete Boots).(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... Its about time Concrete Boots had a house architect. Nominations for future candidates will be gratefully received, but the first incumbent must surely be Roger Dean. His qualifications are suitably shaky: he's not actually an architect; he's...

Buffalo boys. (Concrete Boots).(Lorenzo Buffalo designed one of Saddam's palaces; reporter uncertain how to report)(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... The coverage of the war in Iraq took a bizarre twist on Monday when grizzled war reporters struggled to switch from military mode to Loyd Grossman-mode as they went "through the keyhole" into Saddam's abandoned palaces. One Sky reporter's...

Day of rest? (Concrete Boots).(three architects at Sheppard Robson in athletic competition)(Brief Article)
April 11, 2003... If you are lolling in the recliner on Sunday morning, spare a thought for your colleagues at Sheppard Robson. As if finding enough commercial contracts to keep the business ticking over wasn't enough, three of the architects, Markus Reisinger,...