Building Design articles from February 2002

Building Design archives from February 2002

Allies & Morrison, Christine Hawley Architects, Dominique Perrault, Snohetta & Spence and OMA.
February 1, 2002... Caption: Will Alsop has beaten opposition from Allies & Morrison, Christine Hawley Architects, Dominique Perrault, Snahetta & Spence and OMA to design a new arts complex at Goldsmiths College, south-east London, the fashionable art school that...

Simpson's Stirling setback.
February 1, 2002... Ian Simpson Architects' ambition of scooping the 2002 Stirling prize with its landmark Urbis museum in central Manchester has been dashed due to a delay in the scheme's completion. In what Ian Simpson described as "a real disappointment",...

Can you tell what it is yet?
February 1, 2002... Some of Britain's brightest architecture students are producing work that not even their experienced tutors can understand, never mind clients, planners and the public. This is the warning of Bartlett professor Peter Cook to his design...

Prince's man puts design elite on trial.
February 1, 2002... The Prince of Wales' favourite masterplanner, Leon Krier, has launched a stinging attack on Richard Rogers, Norman Foster and Terence Conran and brought simmering tension between modernists and traditionalists back to the boil. Krier, who...

White Design. (News).
February 1, 2002... Caption: Bristol-based architect White Design has completed this "marketecture" building for window manufacturer Velux. The new regional sales office in Northamptonshire, aims to embody the company's own "room in the roof" mantra.

Demolition looms for station. (News).
February 1, 2002... The future of Preston bus station could be decided by the end of this month when Terry Farrell & Partners is due to present its ideas to local councillors. The architect and developer Grosvenor is refusing to say whether it will be seeking...

Nelson fighters sense victory. (News).
February 1, 2002... The unlikely alliance of English Heritage and 2,000 Muslim residents in Nelson, east Lancashire, claimed it was on course for victory this week in its battle to save 400 Victorian terraced houses from demolition. The closing stages of the...

Funding blow for London. (News).
February 1, 2002... A far-reaching project to upgrade 100 public spaces in the capital is in danger of collapse following the Greater London Assembly's announcement that it plans to cut its urban renaissance budget by [pounds sterling]100,000. The scheme, to...

Grimshaw's rethinks tower. (News).
February 1, 2002... Westminster planners were set to send Nicholas Grimshaw & Partners back to the drawing board for a second time on its office tower over Paddington station this week. Planning officers have recommended that the authority's planning...

Bristol tower set to be rejected. (News).
February 1, 2002... The head of urban design at Bristol City Council has said he is minded to block a controversial tower proposal from architect Stride Treglown. The practice proposes to site a 32-storey mixed-use tower next to Brunel's grade 1 listed Temple...

Aukett sheds staff: pan-European practice plans greater consulting role as profit margin slumps. (News).
February 1, 2002... Aukett Europe has shed around 50 staff in the last 12 months as it watched its profits halved to just [pounds sterling]920,000 in 2001, it revealed this week. The practice attributed the slump to jittery occupiers and developers shelving...

Foster's slopes off at Spitalfields. (News).
February 1, 2002... Foster & Partners has dropped its controversial ski-slope design for the final part of the Spitalfields redevelopment in east London. As Foster's works all hours to produce a redesign, it has emerged that English Heritage was one of the...

Brady to battle for more female judges. (News).
February 1, 2002... The pressure group Women in Architecture is to step up its campaign for better representation of female practitioners by demanding more female places on architectural panels and juries. The group is drawing up a list of female architects...

Jestico & Whiles.
February 1, 2002... Caption: Jestico & Whiles has won planning permission for a permanent office building to replace the temporary Haworth Tompkins-designed Almeida Theatre at King's Cross in London. The [pounds sterling]4.2 million head office for the...

Berkeley Homes signs up Ian Ritchie. (News).
February 1, 2002... Berkeley Homes has appointed Ian Ritchie to design his first scheme for a volume house builder. Ritchie is one of a trio of innovative practices hired by the mass-market housing giant to design schemes in London. The others are Rolfe Judd...

Development Securities and Berkeley Homes.
February 1, 2002... Caption: Sheppard Robson has won a [pounds sterling]370 million contract to regenerate the heart of Slough in partnership with Development Securities and Berkeley Homes. The London-based practice, which beat competition from Argent Securities...

Construction to join Earth Summit. (News).
February 1, 2002... The UK construction industry, one of the country's biggest polluters, intends to make a significant input into the 2002 Earth Summit in Johannesburg in September. By demonstrating examples of good practice at its own conference on May 14...

Design champions for social sector. (News).
February 1, 2002... The Housing Corporation has created two design champions to improve the social rented sector's quality. Board member Duncan Michael, and Clive Turner, director of the social housing quango's south-east division, have been given a remit to...

Skills gap could threaten heritage. (News).
February 1, 2002... The heritage sector is suffering from a worrying skills gap that could put the future of historic buildings and landscapes at risk unless "urgent action" is taken to tackle the problem, according to a report from the Heritage Lottery Fund. ...

Arb rule change 'lacks data': regulator admits there is a lack of evidence to justify rule changes on indemnity insurance levels. (News).
February 1, 2002... Leading members of Arb have admitted that the regulator does not have evidence to prove that its tough new regulations on architects' minimum levels of insurance cover are justified. At a meeting of the Arb board in London last week, one...

NY opposition to tower designs. (News).
February 1, 2002... A community leader in lower Manhattan has attacked designs by 45 of the world's leading architects for a new World Trade Centre now showing at a New York gallery. Madelyn Wils, chair of community board 1, lower Manhattan, said: "1 saw a...

HOK.
February 1, 2002... Caption: HOK has issued designs for a stainless-steel reworking of the Essex County Showground near Chelmsford. The scheme includes this new central building as well as a showground area, training centre and some ancillary buildings. The scheme...

Architecture in the altogether. (Leader).
February 1, 2002... It has been a fair argument that the output of our bastions of architectural education has for some time been a classic example of the emperor's new clothes. Visits to the more radical summer shows have often been met by the same furrowed brows...

Big cheese. (Concrete Boots).
February 1, 2002... The monumental housing transfer being proposed in Birmingham has a new advocate, "Big" Ron Atkinson--former Aston Villa manager and full-time footy pundit. The perma-tanned legend has been enlisted by the council to persuade tenants to accept...

Adam rant. (Concrete Boots).
February 1, 2002... The traditionalists at Robert Adam's conference on traditional design last week think they know who their enemies are. It's you, the BD reader. Yes, this motley alliance seems to think you constitute the modernist threat. But whatever you do...

Bunny flop. (Concrete Boots).
February 1, 2002... Broadway Malyan managing director Peter Crossley is wrestling with handling the media at the moment and is suffering from that perennial problem, the injudicious quote. Crossley innocently gave a development magazine a rundown of his working...

New year revolution. (Concrete Boots).
February 1, 2002... Arb appears to be suffering from a bout of taking life a little too seriously. An item on the agenda last week was to consider a response to an e-mail widely circulated among RIBA members moaning about the new Plirules. It was headed "No cure...

Point blank. (Concrete Boots).
February 1, 2002... For a man who intends to preside over the construction of up to 20 new towers in the capital, Ken Livingstone might want to keep quiet about the tall buildings he admires. Quizzed by members of the commons urban affairs subcommittee, Ken...

Slough motion. (Concrete Boots).
February 1, 2002... "Come, friendly bombs, and fall on Slough/It isn't fit for humans now/ There isn't grass to graze a cow/ Swarm over, Death!" That's how John Betjeman saw this saddest of Berkshire towns. But now that this much-maligned metropolis is...

Microflat life, Big Brother-style. (Comment & Analysis).
February 1, 2002... Having Oxford Street as your front garden, Selfridges as your backyard and an omnipresent public gawping and giggling as you eat your morning muesli in your jim-jams is a somewhat nerve-wracking proposition, writes Karen Glaser. But it is...

Moneo man: Rafael Moneo was all modesty as he discussed two of his Spanish cultural projects at the LSE. (Comment & Analysis).
February 1, 2002... "Density and modesty--those are the two words that I would come away with tonight," said Picky Burdett, director of the cities programme at the London School of Economics. Burdett was concluding the Spanish architect Jose Rafael Moneo's...

Practising Muslim. (News Feature).
February 1, 2002... Since September 11, the world's attention has focused on Islam in an unprecedented way. David Littlefield talks to tour British Muslim architects--including an RIBA presidential contender--about how their religion affects their profession. ...

Letters.(Letter to the Editor)
February 1, 2002... Student digs From John Burkett, London Here we go again with the perennial argument between architectural education and the practice of architecture (News January 25). The essential element in architectural education is that the end...

Back to the roots.(Editorial)
February 1, 2002... I spent last weekend working home-made puppets of vegetables in national costume, two shows daily. This confession may not suggest an obvious link to architecture, but there is one. The puppet show was part of a pantomime at the Art Workers...

Dream narrative: The National Gallery of Ireland's Millennium Wing in Dublin by Benson & Forsyth has been opened inside out to become something altogether more democratic. (Benson & Forsyth, Dublin).
February 1, 2002... Tacked onto a modest Georgian house, Benson & Forsyth's Millennium Wing extension to the National Gallery of Ireland appears deceptively polite. But the facade. masks the Grand Canyon of Dublin interiors--a soaring, tapering chasm of an...

Out of the blue: Ben van Berkel drew a capacity audience to his 'Blue Period' lecture at the Architectural Association. Those who squeezed in were not disappointed. (Culture).
February 1, 2002... Ben van Berkel denies that he's a superstar, but more than half an hour before his Architectural Association lecture is due to start, the hail and its annexe are full way beyond capacity, the bookshop has sold out of Move and staff are pleading...

Academic differences: rather than opinions about Reyner Banham, read the man himself. (Culture).(Reyner Banham: Historian of the Immediate Future)(Book Review)
February 1, 2002... Reyner Banham once wrote a major essay on the relative significance of the potato crisp as compared with the taco chip, with particular reference to structural strength, acoustic performance, and the role of women in society. He talked...

Diary.
February 1, 2002... LECTURES WEDNESDAY * Joseph Rykwert from the University of Pennsylvania, anthropology and the city; the city in perspective; and defensible space, columns and obelisks. Venue Old Theatre, LSE, Houghton Street, London 6pm. ...

Brief encounter: when pitching for work, second guessing the client can be as important as reading the brief. David Littlefield looks at how three practices approached for the same project. (Practice).
February 1, 2002... Just before Christmas, Gregory Phillips Architects won a commission to convert a pair of ageing ex-industrial buildings into studio spaces for what developer Transformer describes as "small, relatively well-heeled, established, creative...

Let's pretend. (Back Space).(Editorial)
February 1, 2002... I keep hoping that Faking It, Channel 4'S excellent occasional TV series where people are given four weeks in which to learn a totally new profession to the standard where they can fool a panel of experts, is going to take on architects. While...

Ian Martin. (Back Space).
February 1, 2002... Monday Emergency meeting of Babar, the elephantine registration board responsible for disciplining architects and putting up insurance. There are heated exchanges. Architect members complain that the hike in PI cover will destroy small...

Ethics warning to RIBA Olympians: Workers' rights in the spotlight as institute prepares mission to bag Beijing billions.(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... British architects targeting China have been warned to secure the highest standards of human rights for contractors and other workers, after it emerged this week that the RIBA is backing a trade mission to Beijing in the spring in a bid to...

Hodder Associates' controversial Clissold Leisure Centre.(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... Caption: Mystery surrounds the final construction cost on Hodder Associates' controversial Clissold Leisure Centre in Stoke Newington, Hackney, which opened to the public last Saturday. BO understands the scheme cost is in the order of [pounds...

YAYA 2002 lift-off.(Young Architect of the Year Award)(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... A four-strong shortlist has been announced for this years Building Design/Corus Young Architect of the Year Award. In the running for the prize, now in its fifth year, are Meta Infrastructural Domain, based in London; Plasma Studio, also...

Assembly raps Ken's city tower plan.(Ken Livingstone; Greater London Assembly)(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... The Greater London Assembly has delivered a comprehensive attack on Ken Livingstone's support for more skyscrapers in key London boroughs such as the City and Westminster. In a report published this week, the elected members called on the...

Access declined: Disabled architect warns that new rules of the disabilities act will be avoided because of cost burdens. (News).(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... An architect paralysed from the chest down has hit out against the profession's approach towards disabled access and called on every architect to "spend a day in a wheelchair just to see how different life is". Carl Everingham, who...

Elephant & Castle set-back. (News).(development in South London)(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... The much-delayed plans to regenerate south London's Elephant & Castle area received a fresh set-back this week when community leaders said they were not ready to support the proposed development agreement and threatened "a massive protest" if...

RIBA fears it is losing influence. (News).(in light of growth at Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment, Arb)(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... The RIBA has revealed it is afraid that the growing profile of the Arb and the Commission for Architecture & the Built Environment is reducing the institute's influence in architecture. In a document outlining the major risks facing the...

Mies Villa clean-up. (News).(Tugendhat Villa in Brno in need of repair)(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... Mies van der Rohe's world-famous Tugendhat Villa at Brno in the Czech Republic is in a disastrous state according to the Museum of Applied Arts in Austria. The organisation had called for the building to be reconstructed following a...

Arb prosecution. (News).(John Morgan fined for false representation)(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... Arb has successfully prosecuted John Morgan of Stoke-on-Trent for misuse of title. Morgan claimed on his business card that he was an architect when in fact he was not qualified. He pleaded guilty to misuse of title before Brent Magistrates...

HOK does Brum. (News).(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... HOK International's masterplan for the regeneration of a 40ha site in Eastside, Birmingham, was unveiled last week. The scheme includes a library, a technology institute, and the restoration of historic listed buildings at Warwick Bar to form a...

Dagenham ideas. (News).
February 8, 2002... The London Borough of Barking & Dagenham is holding an open ideas competition to help develop concepts for the development of learning and working space in the home. The competition is funded by the Government's Neighbourhood Renewal Fund and...

Liverpool win. (News).(for Atelier 2)(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... Atelier 2's plan to build a replica of the historic Casartelli Building on its original site has been granted permission by Liverpool councillors. The planning committee has also granted retrospective planning permission for the removal of the...

Long stretch for Coppergate: 'Unusually shambolic' inquiry into Chapman Taylor's proposed York shopping centre piles pressure on a beleaguered system. (News).(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... The public inquiry into Chapman Taylor's controversial Coppergate shopping centre in York is set to massively overrun its schedule, triggering fears of rising costs for participants and a major delay in a decision. The inquiry now looks...

Glenn Howells Architects.(is ready to go ahead with arts center in Bromsgrve, Worcestershire)(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... Caption: Glenn Howells Architects' proposal for a [pounds sterling]2.5 million arts centre in Bromsgrove, Worcestershire, finally looks set to happen after being on hold for more than a year. The three-storey scheme is to contain a 300-seat,...

Show of unity for RIBA and Arb over education. (News).(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... The RIBA and Arb have moved to scotch fears that the two bodies are drifting apart over their approach to education. In a show of unity, they published a joint statement this week branding talk of a crisis in architectural education...

Drawings hijack rejected. (News).(Royal Institute of British Architects' collection)(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... The Royal Academy has dismissed a proposal by a group of high-profile architects to wrest control of the RIBA's drawing collection from the Victoria & Albert Museum and house it in the academy's Burlington Gardens building. David Gordon,...

[pounds sterling]500m Ghana win for Black Architects: Accra masterplan could be exemplar for African architecture. (News).(Elsie Owusu Architects is among firms in consortium that won contract)(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... A multi-disciplinary consortium led by leading lights of the Society of Black Architects has scooped a [pounds sterling]500 million commission to produce a masterplan for the Ghanain capital of Accra. The country's president, John Kuffour,...

Feilden Clegg Bradley is collaboratinq with Japanese architect-cum-artist Kisa Kawakami on a monument at the Royal Air Force Museum in Hendon.
February 8, 2002... Caption: Feilden Clegg Bradley is collaboratinq with Japanese architect-cum-artist Kisa Kawakami on a monument at the Royal Air Force Museum in Hendon. The sculpture is beinq considered by planners and has been dubbed "Skydance". Engineerinq...

Surveyors covet cathedral work. (News).(Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, England)(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... Architects' supremacy as the guardians of England's cathedrals is under threat from the surveying profession which this week wrote to the Church of England's general synod demanding that it lift a ruling that restricts the prestigious role of...

Caruso St John heads [pounds sterling]9m museum refurb. (News).(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... The Bethnal Green Museum of Childhood in east London has appointed Caruso St John to oversee its ambitious [pounds sterling]9 million refurbishment and redevelopment program. The museum, which is part of the Victoria & Albert Museum, hopes...

Wobbly no more. (News).(Millennium Bridge)(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... Arup says that the "total solution" to correct the beleaguered Millennium Bridge is now in place and that it has no plans to modify it further. An Arup spokeswoman said the 37 dampers and 54 tuned-mast dampers fitted to the bridge since...

Belfast archicentre could boost design. (News).(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... Belfast City Council is at the early stages of drawing up plans for a permanent architecture centre to help direct increased property investment into buildings with quality design. Following the ceasefire between paramilitaries in the...

Optimism over go-ahead for Victoria Square retail scheme. (News).(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... A public inquiry into the largest retail development in Belfast city centre for a decade wound up last week, with hopes running high that the scheme would receive the go-ahead. A 10-day hearing examined land purchases for the [pounds...

Makeover for Dublin's ugliest. (News).(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... The Irish government is to pay for a [pounds sterling]20 million facelift of what is widely held to be Dublin's ugliest office block, awarding the contract to Murray O'Laoire, one of the republic's largest practices. Hawkins House, a...

2000 Annual PFI Awards.(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... Caption: The [pounds sterling]23 million award-winning Laganside Courts Complex in Belfast, one of the first law courts to be built under the Private Finance Initiative, opens this month. Designed by Manchester-based architect The Hurd Rolland...

Ethics must work in practice. (Leader).(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... Vacuum-cleaner king James Dyson announced this week that he was transferring the manufacture of his products to the Far East. This globalising trend, which follows on the heels of companies such as Nike and Reebok in search of cheaper labour,...

New Labour, new Ghana. (Concrete Boots).(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... Interesting timing this week in the announcement of the first job in Africa for Labour's favourite architect, Richard Rogers. Does the new passion for Ghana at RRP have a parallel in Tony Blair's four-day tour of Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone...

Into the Urbis? (Concrete Boots).(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... Ian Simpson's sleek Urbis building in Manchester is receiving some puzzled looks from locals who are wondering what the towering structure is actually for. There are whispers that the site board saying "This is Urbis" should be change to...

Portland stoned. (Concrete Boots).(Royal Institute of British Architects)(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... The plan to turn the RIBA's sober London headquarters into a Bacchanalian pleasure dome is pressing ahead under the presidency of the renowned party animal Paul Hyett. The institute is planning to splash [pounds sterling]300,000 on the...

On the cards. (Concrete Boots).
February 8, 2002... Oh dear, the Arb is in the doghouse with the profession again -- this time over the design of its new membership cards which will be nestling next to organ-donor cards and wine cash &carry membership in the wallet of your average architect for...

Out for a viaduct. (Concrete Boots).(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... Rumours are circulating among the tweed and elbow patches crew at English Heritage that culture minister Tessa Jowell is on the verge of listing the Braithwaite viaduct at Bishopsgate on the north edge of the City. Their hopes have been raised...

Learning curves. (Alan Powers).(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... There can now be few people around who knew Erik Gunnar Asplund personally, since he died in 1940, but Michael Grice, who was one of the founders of Architects' Co-Partnership, had a unique experience of going to work for him in 1936-7, aged...

Letters.(Brief Article)(Letter to the Editor)
February 8, 2002... Nonsense versus From Peter Ahrends, London You report that Leon Krier, the so-called Prince's man, is suggesting a public debate on "modernism versus urbanism" (News February 1) - a nonsensical and misleading basis for informed...

Keeping the dream alive. (Comment & Analysis).(Royal Institute of British Architects)(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... Peter Cook, head of the Bartlett, has threatened to abandon RIBA accreditation in the face of moves to focus on business and practice. Here he explains just what he believes to be so special a about UK architectural education. Architecture...

Over the threshold: His first built work since setting up in Denmark, Chris Thurlbourne's remarkable house blurs boundaries while providing interesting and defined spaces. (Building Study).(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... Since being shortlisted for last year's Young Architect of the Year Award, Chris Thurlbourne has made his mark further afield. His first major built project is a house for him to live and work in. It lies on a difficult setting: one of the few...

Tomorrow's world: is the Barbican's new popularity proof that it was always ahead of its time, or is it just the latest whim of the cult revivalists? (Culture).(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... If This Was Tomorrow, the title of the show opening next week on the Barbican at the Barbican, has a nostalgic futurism to it then it's deliberate. So long derided as an iconic failure of the modernist city ideal -- and as an incomprehensible...

Tribute wrong: Dresden's award-winning synagogue is a loaded subject, but a lecture by the architect failed to ignite. (Culture).(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... Building a synagogue in Germany, the country that orchestrated the most terrible event in all Jewish history, is clearly problematic. Many Jews still find it difficult to visit the country and even more are puzzled at the growing trickle of...

Text and the city: at last, writes Catherine Croft, a lucid and compelling linguistics book.(The Words Between the Spaces: Buildings and Language)(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... Architect Thomas Markus and linguist Deborah Cameron have collaborated to produce The Words Between the Spaces: Buildings and Language, an investigation of how language is used to talk about buildings and how it affects not just how we...

Practice are you ready to go public?(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... It's pointless having a genius for design if nobody's heard of you. David Litlefield looks at practices that have turned to PR. Prices vary, but public relations consultancies can charge anything from [pound sterling]100 to [pound...

On the city limits. (Back Space).(Brief Article)
February 8, 2002... Can cities still be works of art? The question seems to be irrelevant when set against the reality of the contradictory forces that are at play in contemporary European agglomerations. The ideal of a coherent human artefact assembled from...

Ian Martin.(Column)(Editorial)
February 8, 2002... Monday Finish sketches for my Athens Olympics 2004 all-weather Velcrodome. Most of the construction's materials are cheap, but the roofs a rip-off. Tuesday More Olympic fever at the RIPBA. President Phil Wallop will lead a delegation to...

40 years on Archigram strikes Gold.(Royal Gold Medal for Architecture)(Brief Article)
February 15, 2002... They haven't worked together for decades and they never put up a building, but this week Archigram walked away with the RI BA's most prestigious prize, the Royal Gold Medal for Architecture. Explaining the decision, which some in the...

MPs reject chancellor's urban apathy.(Brief Article)
February 15, 2002... Labour's commitment to securing an urban renaissance in Britain was cast into fresh doubt this week after a powerful parliamentary watchdog attacked its continued refusal to offer essential regeneration tax breaks. The House of Commons...