This impressive building on the Thames was originally built as the home of a parliamentary democracy. Other than being the venue for occasional commercial and heritage events, it has largely fallen into disuse.
owen said:mainly by the very wealthy. the very similar (styllistically speaking) thamesmead development
is considered a failure, and is inhabited by the very poor. the alienation 'caused' by these structures depends i think on the alienation the inhabitants already feel. but the 'social dynamics' are horribly complicated. the brutalists (smithsons etc) thought that their streets in the sky would be more attentive to the social needs of their working class inhabitants than the le corbusier inspired 'radiant cities' (eg alton estate in roehampton, with its masses of green space, its lack of a centre) and are now equally derided.
owen said:in a similar vein, this wonderful thing in bloomsbury
which i had always thought was originally a swimming pool, but was apparently a garage when it was built in 1931...is a v good spot there- senate house at one end, the brunswick centre at the other, the brutalist Unison building, british library and st pancras round the corner.
Horribly complicated is the thing, and personally, I'm not entirely sure what the questions are let alone the answers. Certainly, a lot of modernist social housing was planned based on a certain assumption of how people would behave in a given environment which turned out to be optimistic. As you say, there's a fairly obvious class issue, compounded by (but not reducible to) the fact that rich people are more likely to be willing and able to pay for security, cleaners, effective lighting, lift repairs and so on.owen said:these are very very interesting questions...
i) can you expand on this a bit? cos this is for me a class question. eg, the barbican
is socially considered a 'success', and is not coincidentally inhabited mainly by the very wealthy. the very similar (styllistically speaking) thamesmead development
is considered a failure, and is inhabited by the very poor. the alienation 'caused' by these structures depends i think on the alienation the inhabitants already feel. but the 'social dynamics' are horribly complicated.
Well, I've seen some very nice modernist (afaict) stuff that mixes brick and wood and glass in with the concrete - I'm not sure how strictly that adheres to truth to materials, though.ii) again some 60s types- the smithsons again f'rinstance- already made this criticism. but yeah it is an unanswerable one. something like the National Theatre
i love dearly but have to admit a certain crapness when it gets damp...truth to materials perhaps not always a good thing...
Yeah, exactly. But pragmatically, are there features that can be incorporated into the design that minimize the effect of chronic underfunding? Although I guess your pointiii) will they fuck.
is pretty much it.one can't really conceive social housing without a concommitant idea of the social. and there, i would say, is the rub...
luka said:here we go...
'An imposing art deco building, covering two and one quarter acres, it was built 1927-1933 as a memorial to the many Freemasons who died on active service in the First World War. Initially known as the Masonic Peace Memorial, it reverted to the name Freemasons' Hall at the outbreak of war in 1939.
In 1925 an international architectural competition was held. One hundred and ten schemes were submitted from which the jury - chaired by Sir Edwin Lutyens - selected ten to be fully worked up. The winning design was by the London partnership of H V Ashley and Winton Newman. The building is now Grade 2 listed internally and externally and is the only art deco building in London which has been preserved 'as built' and is still used for its original purpose.'
http://www.grandlodge-england.org/ugle/the-history-of-freemasons-hall.htm
luka said:
Oh yeah, that's really cool. I used to live near there and I never ever noticed that. I reckon I walk by things like that all the time without taking it in. I've really enjoyed looking at this thread and I think it makes me look around me more when I'm walking through the city.'For retail early-1900s style, travel down to Whitechapel and you can see the curiosity of Wickham’s department store. It was the grandest store in the East End until it closed in 1969. But look again and you see Wickham’s was built in two halves, with a small shop in the middle. The little shop had been on the site since Mr Spiegelhalter had travelled from Germany in 1820 to set up his watchmaker business in Whitechapel. In 1927, the increasingly successful Wickhams wanted to expand, but the Spiegelhalter family stubbornly refused to sell out. The solution? Wickham’s had to build their new monolith in two parts – with the jewellers in the middle.'