Social Reform Through Architecture

Designing for the Others: Encouraging Social Reform Through Architecture

Contents

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Foreword

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The Gentleman Architect

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The “ Others’ ” Architecture: Pioneers of Inclusive Design

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Housing for the Many: The Phalansteries

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Emancipation: Model Towns and the English Park Movement

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The Temptation of a Far-Left Rhetoric

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Bibliography

The architectural profession, going as far back as antiquity, has ultimately been reliant on how people earn their living. Clients were traditionally those who controlled a larger capital and wielded more political or economic power, as the architect’s services were a premium that people from lower ranking groups were not able, or prepared to, employ. However, although an intrinsically responsive discipline, it also has itself the potential to influence political, economic, and social aspects of society. During the 18th and 19th century architects did just that, adapting to the new social order and advancing ideas of egalitarian society and adequate living conditions.

The shift in the social status and type of work employed had an im mense effect on how contemp orar y architect ural practice functions and is perceived.

Fig 1, cover: The Poor Man’s Shelter Plate 151, Ledoux

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The Gentleman Architect

21st March 1775 “There were a king with a large jaw and a queen with a plain face, on the throne of England; there were a king with a large jaw and a queen with a fair face, on the throne of France. In both countries it was clearer than crystal to the lords of the State preserves of loaves and fishes, that things in general were settled for ever. It was the year of Our Lord one t hous a nd s even hundre d a nd seventy-five.”(Dickens 2005, p.11)

Britain’s predominantly agrarian economy was dominated by the established landowners and the political scene was centred around the hereditary nobility. The opulently decorated manors and public buildings contrasted with the living conditions of the “many”/ “others”. France, although much different in development to Britain, itself wields superficial power rigidly controlled by the Bourbon court and has a thriving population with many of the social issues seen in Britain. However, France was heavily in debt after the French involvement in the American Revolution and the heavy taxation left the population poorer and many living in increasingly unsanitary conditions.

The inclinations of the aristocracy, the client of the time, dominated not just the political and economic scene, but also perpetuated ideas in art and architecture (Risebero 1985, p.11). Among them was the gentleman architect,(McElwee 2016, p.19) cultured, enjoying a high social status and willing to assist through his art in the process of class expression of his clients.(Reeves 2015) The products of the collaboration were often reverent to classical and antiquated orders of architecture, a condition that allowed the former master builder to alienate himself from the practicalities of the building site and its roots in common society in order to further advance his social standing as an esteemed artist. It was a natural evolution of his role.

Amid the intensification of industrialism and increasing class polarity of the 18th century, the bourgeoisie gained economic power and presented the cultured architect with an identity problem. He belonged to the institutions of the ancien régime, but the aristocratic assembly stood in the way of economic growth, which was actually the source of the architect’s livelihood and existence. Furthermore, the ver y ex istence of aristocracy was challenged by the new inquisitive and progressive bourgeois, with ideas based on the enlightenment texts of Voltaire and Rousseau, who spoke of freedom as an intrinsic right, universal equality, and unprecedented p eace (A non 20 02). However, many architect s undoubtedly benefited from the new distribution of wealth. By embracing the new social ideologies they guaranteed the perpetuation of the profession and carved themselves a place in the new world.

In reflecting the humanist agenda of the time, architecture provided simple visual equivalents by reverting to pre-Roman aesthetics as an ideal of uncorrupted dignity, free of the noxious influences of the aristocratic Renaissance style (Risebero 1985, p.13). Architects became more articulate and aware of their social responsibilities and the socialist ideals, with some of the first cultured architect designs for lower classes emerging. Thus, “the others” , or at least a few of “the others”, would benefit from planned housing and the

gentleman architect would take the first steps towards what now is an integral and signif icant part of the scop e of work of the architectural profession. (Anon 2017)

Fig.2, on page 4, faded, detail: A View of the Tower of London, Supposed on his Majesty's Birthday 1771, Samuel Scott, Oil on canvas

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The “ Others’ ” Architecture: Pioneers of Inclusive Design

In late 18th century France, the social transformations linked to the new school of thought were emb odied in many increasingly significant building typologies, such as hospitals, theatres, and prisons. Domestic architecture, the most intimate of building typologies, also saw significant changes. The previously strictly regulated social distinctions were greatly relaxed, and the very basis of architectural design gradually altered (Rosenau 1946).

salines” (Maupeau and Abbe Terray 1771)(Vidler 1990, p.75). He saw the opportunity to develop it and transformed the project into the nucleus of what will later become his prototype for the ideal plan, with a variety of public amenities but most importantly adequate worker’s housing. Ledoux seems to give a sort of preliminar y blueprint for a “Phalanster” of Fourier and a“Garden City” of Ebenezer Howard (Rosenau 1946).

Claude-Nicolas Ledoux (1736-1806) was one of the first of his time to implement some of the advancements in building design. This architect had an outspoken sympathy for the aesthetic ideas of the Enlightenment, yet his identification with their views of reform of agriculture and industry was never extended to embrace the more radical consequences of the doctrine, possibly due to his patronage and source of livelihood (Vidler 2006, p.23)(Vidler 1990, p.75). In Ledoux’s utopia, the Ancien Regime would be preserved, but each member of society would benefit from architectural recognition and adequate living conditions, from the lowest to the highest levels of society. The illustrative project for his views on planning and cooperation is the saltwork at Chaux, built between 1771 to 1779, and theoretically advanced after the French Revolution.

Ledoux was appointed to “oversee the conservation and maintenance of the springs and salt water wells of the said salines (...) as well as the building constructed or about to be constructed for the said

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Fig 3, right: Plan General de la Saline de Chaux;Not realised; Plate 117; C N Ledoux

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Providing accommodation for at least some of the manufacturing work force was common practice in most isolated industrial estates, in the form of barracks with limited facilities. Ledoux’s prominent salt worker’s housing comprised of six four-bedroom apartments each, with a long corridor. In the main space of each pavilion, a communal kitchen and communal space echoed, yet again, the Enlightenment ideologies. Around this centre, on the upper level, a gallery supported by grandiose wooden pillars gave access to the granar y (Vidler 1990, p.102). The masonr y buildings provided unprecedented living conditions for the workers and the facade decoration, although austere at the time, elevated the importance of the buildings and subsequently that of the occupiers.

Ledoux fell out of favour and was imprisoned for a few years after the completion of the saltwork, but returned after the revolution to develop his utopia n drea m, now more cent red on idea s of brotherhood and equality (Vidler 2006, p.135). Based on the built aesthetics at Chaux, the architect continued the rhetoric of designing for “the other” in the “community centre” - the House of Unity - for the study of commerce, agriculture, and the arts. It includes halls of a ss embly and a librar y, for t he us e of b ot h workers and management, with no hierarchical internal separation of spaces.

Ornamentation, although scarce, is used as a social leveller.

Another example of the same type, likely to be unprecedented, is the “Oikema” house, devoted to sex education as a preparation for

marriage. Its symbolism for a rite of passage is reflected in the phallic plan and the lack of any windows on the facades maintains the private nature of the building (Rosenau 1946, p.164).

Emil Kaufmann has introduced the popular view that Ledoux represented the beginnings of modern architecture(Kaufmann 1952, p.431), however Ledoux’s views could just be seen the most radical architectural views of the 18th century, but not necessarily a new beginning. His pupils display a more radical and forward thinking ideology(Kruft 1994, p.272).

Fig 4,5,6,7, from left to right, top first: Clerk’s building, Ground Floor Plan, Clerk’s building, First Floor Plan Plate 134, C N ledoux Clerk’s building, Main Facade Clerk’s building, Section Plate 135, C N Ledoux

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Fig 8, pages 10&11: Aerial View of Saline de Chaux; Not fully realised; (Vidler 2006, page 12) Fig 9,10, from left to right: Spouting Run at the Saline de Chaux (Vidler 2006, page 66) Aerial View of Saline de Chaux htt p:// w w w.d ij o n b e au n em a g.f r, accessed 21.03.2017

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Across the Channel, in Britain, prominent architects adopted the social inclusion pursuit as secondary to an aesthetic revolution. The country made a considerable contribution to the discovery of the architecture of Antiquity , especially Greece, though the works of James Stuart, Thomas Hope, John Foster, John Soane, and others.

John Soane (1753-1837) was expected to continue the ideologies of Ledoux after coming under his influence in his travels. However, although a Freemason like Ledoux (Watkin 1995) and presumably aware of his obligations to promote brotherhood and equality, the social agenda of his design was mostly lacking (Risebero 1985, p.14).

The pace of progress in Britain was not necessarily lethargic, but rather influenced by the unique political situation that allowed the bourgeois to rise to political power after the Glorious Revolution of 1688, therefore delaying the class str uggle needed to trigger revolutionary ideas.

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Housing for the Many: The Phalansteries

Back in France, the momentum gathered by the Revolutionar y Architects continued and crystallized in the ideas about architecture, and above all town planning, of the utopian socialist Charles Fourier (1772-1837). Fourier theorised on architecture and urban design to match the final stages of his social model, the “garantiste” guaranteed living conditions. He imagines a unitary architecture that encourages social harmony. To be integrated in the neoRenaissance plan, Fourier proposed pioneering housing units, the phalansteries, or large scale community housing blocks, to house at least 24 families or 400 people each (Kruft 1994, p.286). Therefore, this was truly a project meant to house the larger proportion of the population, the working class, in adequate and sanitary conditions.

Each member of a Phalanstery would participate in community life, contributing with different skills and knowledge, in a brotherly/ sisterly atmosphere. In return for labour, food and lodging would be assure in accordance to each member’s capability - but free for children. Members, by investing their funds in the Phalanster y organisation, would have a guaranteed steady income for the rest of their lives. Normally, the labouring class often did not have a guaranteed place of work or income in old age. A steady working place was also a commodity, with most people competing for petty jobs to earn a meager pay (Zoe De Gamond 1841, page 25).

Fourier’s theoretical description did not culminate in the design of the housing units. It was only after his death that the prominent

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industrialist Jean-Baptiste-Andre Godin (1817-1888) designed and built the Familistere in Guise (1859), based on Fourier’s description.

His intention was to improve housing for workers working in his factory, along with improving general “production, trade, supply, education, and recreation opportunities”(Dallet et al. 1908, p.3).

The Familistere is comprised of three large buildings, each four stories high, constructed to house all the workers and their families, with each family having apartments of two or three rooms. The main building consisted of three rectangular blocks joined at the corners. Each block had a large central court covered with a glass roof under which children could play in all weather. Galleries around the courtyard provided access to the apartments on each floor (Holand 1871).

Fig 14: View from the internal courtyard of the Familistère https://media-cdn.tripadvisor.com Fig 15,16: The Familistère, recently refurbished http://www.archdaily.com/484268/ familistere-guise-h2o-architectes

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Emancipation: Model Towns and the English Park Movement

Throughout the 19th century, the effort of industry to take care of its own materialised in many forms, from the model mill and railway town, to utopian towns intended as forerunners of a future liberal state. At the same time as Fourier in France and drawing from Fourier’s utopian conception, Robert Owen (1771 - 1858) set out to put the ideas into practice at New Lanark in Scotland. Through marriage with the owner’s daughter, he became manager of the New Lanark cotton mill in 1800.

His conception that “man’s character is made for him, not by him” contradicted the popular belief that the poor deserved poverty through being idle and vicious. His firm view that the poor were inadequate solely because of their dire circumstances led him to create good living and working conditions for his mill workers (Kruft 1994, page 324).

At its peak, the small rectangular grid town housed over 2500 people. The mill was at the centre of the town, along with several amenities and shops. Children aged between 5 to 10 were educated full time at school, an unheard of practice at the time. The “factory children” were meant to become a self-supporting, self-employing, self- educating new p opulation (Riseb ero 1985, page 22).T he architecture is simple, almost austere in comparison to many developments of the time. Stone terraced houses with white sash windows echoed a cottage architecture. Initially, each family would have only had use of a single room and made use of communal facilities, but gradually by the end of the century the density was reduced to standards similar to contemporary large cities.

Owen’s model town inspired other developments, such as Port Sunlight in Birkenhead and Saltaire in Yorkshire.

Fig 17, 18: View from the bridge, up and down the river, New Lanark https://media-cdn.tripadvisor.com/ media//new-lanark-mill-hotel accessed on 21.03.2017

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In 1815, the Treaty of Amiens ended the Napoleonic Wars. In England, flamboyant celebration gestures were commissioned to celebrate the peace. John Nash (1752-1853) was appointed by the Prince Regent to build a new summer palace in a fashionable style in Brighton. The Royal Pavilion (1815) seems to be a confused, lavish, kitsch, and exciting reinterpretation of several oriental architectural styles, inappropriate in a country still suffering from the effects of a lengthy war. It signalled the change in the role of the monarchy, which could not regain the influence it had before the war. It was, in fact, the empowered middle class capitalist population that paid for the war and the new palace. It was also the middle class, profiting from the second wave of the industrial revolution, that made Britain a global power once more. (Risebero 1985, page 19) The same architect that was building for royalty was now also building for the former workers. Along with Humphrey Repton (17521818) and as part of the English Park Movement, Nash designed a series of “landscaped country estates” around the new Regent’s Park, with a continuous “showcase” facade encasing the majority of the park’s perimeter (started in 1818). Thus, there was a jump from the neo-Classical concept of a villa set in vast grounds, to the prov ision of terrace d housing around t he sa id la nd s cap e d grounds(Frampton 2007, page 23). The adaptation suited the growing middle class and introduced the architectural profession to what is now the main client type in contemporary practice.

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Fig 19: The Regent’s Park section of “Improved map of London for 1833, from Actual Survey. http://www.kristenkoster.com/ regency-primer-london-parks/ acessed on 21.03.2017 Fig. 20: Chester Terrace, Regent’s Park, Author Unknown From The Mirror of Literature, Issue 362, 21.03.1892 Fig. 21: York Terrace East; Current Photograph taken by the author

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18th September, 1848

The Temptation of a Far-Left Rhetoric

A dining room of a given London residence with the sound of thunder in the distance. The conversation, perfumed with seven cigars, finally settles down upon the Paris disturbance of the past few months which have made a constant appearance in morning papers. Intimate accounts of the situation had reached Mr. Allom earlier t hat day, w it h r umour s of Bona par t e gat hering momentum and elections being proposed to subside the liberal-national revolutions. Unsurprising, according to Mr. Burton, as people have long been tried. Even in Britain, for example, there is still a looming threat of anarchy - war in the Punjab, the return of that dreaded potato blight in Ireland only 2 months past, and new reports of cholera in, yet again, Liverpool. A sombre silence and the conversation pauses. We have allowed ourselves to yet again be engulfed by a social crisis.

The first half of the 19th century saw epidemics of cholera in both France and Britain. The 1932 epidemic, caused by overcrowding and poor sanitary conditions, claimed the lives of over 50,000 people in each city. The majority of t hos e affected were t he (still) impoverished working classes, to whom the recent advancements in architecture haven’t reached. Clearly, much more needed to be done.

*Fictional text created by the author in the spirit of Balzac’s Human Comedy sketches 22

In 1854, a new epidemic in London prompted a study by John Snow, a pioneer a nd ca mpa igner for improv ing public sa nit ation, successfully demonstrated that cholera is waterborne by studying the spread of the disease in Soho. He subsequently identified the source of the outbreak to be the water pump on Broad St., which after being reported was disabled by the authorities. Nonetheless, it further brought into view the urgent need for improving living conditions (Goldstein 2012).

Fig. 22: Fishing Boat by Moonlight 1847, William Holman Hunt, Oil on Canvas www.wikiart.org/en/william-holmanhunt/fishingboats-by-moonlight

This is a case when one crisis can generate another, and another. It seems fitting to conclude this short reflection on the socialist rhetoric in architecture by introducing one of the most vocal of its supporters. Whilst France was faced with the complexities and extensive redevelopment of Paris during the Second Republic, in Britain, William Morris (1834-1896), a follower of John Ruskin, was pioneering the Arts and Crafts movement and his strong socialist views. The movement opposed as the degradation of labour by the increasingly industrialised process, and sought for ways to restore to dignity to labour (Scruton 2007). The Red House, built with the help of Philip Webb, had clearly expressed crafted elements and could possibly be regarded as the first modernist house in this respect. (Waithe 2004)

no longer progressive, middle class. The Torry anti-union laws came into effect and overseas colonialism was desperately pursued in order to expand the declining markets. It was an opportune time for revolution. Riots started in West London in 1886, the “Bloody Sunday” in Trafalgar Square in 1887, and the dock strike of 1889 , and the political left was divided between the rhetoric of Morris and Hyndman’s reformism (Bevir 1998).

Luckily, the far-left temptation was avoided and the legacy of the architect remained at an aesthetic level. However, it paved the way for others and reform, contributing to the somewhat balanced contemporary condition.

Synthesised in his novel “News from Nowhere”, Morris created a socialist image of a new society for London in the 21st century. By 1889, Morris forcefully declared that “I call myself a Communist (...)

The aim of Communism seems to me to be to complete equality of condition for all people;” (Davey 1980, p.27). He also believed that the only way to resolve the Puginian class expression paradox was by revolution - bloody if need be, as examples of the past showed their efficiency (Davis 2000).

His political debut coincided with the Great Depression (1873-1896), which facilitated the delivery of the socialist message to a desolate,

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