A collection of photographs showing the rapid acceleration of the destruction of modernist and characterful buildings in London, mostly to be replaced with faceless boring glass office blocks. I know and like(d) many of the buildings that have already disappeared. Shame.
What a fascinating book. I think the problem we may have is that we're throwing babies out with bath water.
But by what aesthetic rule do you distinguish the Hayward, the Brunswick and the Barbican from (to take a couple from near me) Islington Green School and the Packington Estate, or from that horrible lump that stood in the roundabout near the Waterloo Eurostar terminal or the one near Lower Thames Street on the river?
Or perhaps it's not aesthetic at all, or only incidentally, the ones that survive tending to be ones that are still fully in use and appreciated by their inhabitants or visitors. Survival of the fittest?
oooh the packington estate is a lovely place ...... :/
You're right, its about which buildings are in use, which can mean that office buildings get the heave-ho more easily, as they have little sentimental attraction to the people who use them.
Its all down to taste, but I'd rather have a concrete treeless Barbican centre than the mile after mile of 30's semis you see in Birmingham or Wembley
by the way Gaw, have you ever seen the stuff made by the guys who did the Barbican picture above? They're called People will always Need Plates and they make trendy plates and mugs of modernist buildings. I bought a set of 4 for my lady for xmas (to go on the wall- too expensive to actually eat off!)
Worm, most of what you present is new to me but almost always fascinating. One of the reasons I love your blog.
Ceramic plates with modernist buildings on them sounds an interesting twist. Makes a change from English pastoral scenes or celebrations of the Golden Jubilee.
I hope you and your missus have a wonderful Christmas and a New Year of extreme hedonism.
Word verification: Vrjujun, a character from Frank Herbert's Dune.
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