EDGEcondition Vol.06 "heritage" - March 2015

CONDITION

Vo l u m e 0 6 March 2015 ‘heritage’

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ON THE COVER

individual images by Ed Haynes & Sophia Schorr-Kon CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFORMATION ON THE COVER ARTWORK.

EDGEcondition issue 06 published online March 2015 UK Editors: Gem Bar ton Cara Courage Cover ar twork: Copyright Ed Haynes, Sophia Schorr-Kon Opinions expressed are those of the authors.

Ar t Direction: Gem Bar ton @EDGE_CONDITION www.edgecondition.net mail@edgecondition.net

WELCOME

Editors’ note Heritage can be said to be concerned with the conservation and preservation of historic buildings, districts, and landscapes, as well as the design and management of cultural heritage sites. The materiality of heritage resources through documentation, diagnosis, and the treatment of interventions is rich. Thus far, thus familiar.

Of course, heritage is not just a case of preservation and management but enters the realms of symbolism and memory.

There are burgeoning fields of urban and cultural heritage that encourage a critical analysis and assessment of the cultural values that underlie and define preservation policies, laws, and professional norms. What a place – from village to connurbation – defines as its architectural heritage plays a significant role in creating a sense of belonging to communities and an architectural

curation dependent on the subjective collective memory of the past. This is both a cultural and political exercise of power, a making of the past that is chosen to be its representation. The interpretation, presentation, management and conservation of urban and cultural heritage is a matter of urgency and significance for global cities and communities.

As built environment practitioners we face pressing challenges of rapid urbanisation, of economic and environmental sustainability and of social change.

This issue of EDGEcondition presents opinion, practice and projects from a variety of professional and global perspectives, all of which question the modern meaning of heritage as well as what it means to practice with it and within it.

Cara and Gem

LISTINGS

LETTERS:

FROM PERSONAL EXPERIENCE:

04 Daniel Stillwell on Cultivated Heritage in the Wilderness.

30 Jennifer Foraksis gives a personal por trait of being a ‘Hellene’.

06 Graeme Brooker sends a letter from Rio, Brazil in Heritage Futures.

OP-EDS

FEATURES:

36 Joseph Watson explores the radical routes/roots of the Balfron Tower.

10 Ar thur Acheson talks of the Open Days & Culture Nights programme in Nor thern Ireland.

44 Marco Picardi and Felix GrenfellBozek explain the taxidermification of London.

12 Blaithin Quinn reveals the background to the installation piece Beyond Pebbledash.

50 Failed Architecture researched Sharjah’s heritage that will be replaced by heritage.

18 Aisling Joyce tells the stor y of heritage in a divided city - Lucca, Italy.

54 Rachel O’Grady analyses the Making of Heritage in Nor thern India.

20 Roisin McDonald reinterprets the Bucolic Irish Cottage.

PHOTO-ESSAY

24 Kerr y Massheder-Rigby and Alison Doran open the doors of the redevolpment of the Andrew Carnegie Librar y in Liverpool.

66 Colin Priest presents Stomping Ground, the changing face of The Centre, Walton-on-Thames.

74 Matthew Cook presents the Incidental Heritage left behind by canals.

86 Lewis Bush presents Metropole, a project discussing London’s relationship with power.

LETTERS

C U LT I VAT E D H E R I TA G E I N T H E WILDERNESS Dear EDGEcondition, I’m at an impasse, not in terms of my own opinion, beliefs or design ethos but rather of how to react and be active. React against the onslaught upon our Heritage.

Claim some activism to subdue the relentless bulldozing of assets.

Austerity and necessity are not words associated with the current status quo. More like hot headed, seeing red progress, a strange concentrated form of the Victorian progress instilled into our way of life.

From bus shelters to libraries, housing estates of var ying scales to countless other architectural assets, our trigger fingers are overly energetic on the dynamite.

Obviously this is not a mere point I’m making on Heritage in the

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strictest of senses but picturing Architecture with a sense of place, culture and histor y left as nothing but rubble for the latest investment for some anonymous billionaire doesn’t appeal to me much.

In the best possible taste, we can’t stop Architecture aging to a point of no return, a point where demolition due to structural fatigue is imminent but we can go cold turkey on the “allure” of shiny new glass forms in a bid to respect our elders can’t we?

We can’t bottle Heritage down to a little diamond plaque stuck on the front of a half timbered Jacobean building, nor rely solely on the coveted listed status.

It’s about the righteousness of context, the synthesis of locals

and the robustness of our predecessors Architecture. From the daily street scenes to the grandiose skylines, our urban fabric needs these moments of intersection between the old and the new. Not just the new and the slightly faded new.

My own occupation, post student life (for now) has landed me into the world of conser vation and has left me reeling at how fruitful a Heritage we have, especially in the Garden of England (Kent) from which I’m writing to you from.

I’m left as I say at an impasse. For a long time i’ve been wandering the placelessness of modern convenience. The wasteful pristine of tomorrowland, leaving me flabbergasted at the mundane, the sameness of ever ywhere and the lacklustre attempt at richness and diversity.

Now in my mature state of mine I see the twinkle in her eye, my beautiful Heritage. Forgive me for whittling her down to such pleasantries as her looks, wit and charm but we must see through the war and weather torn moments and be fully seduced by the manner of her character and perseverance.

I see a time for activism, to bolster the defences, of which we have many. A time to question nature verses nur ture but in a more

equivocal manner. Etymologically speaking nature, known for it’s restorative powers and for taking it’s own course can leave Architecture in a seemingly serendipitous state of ruin. Some see it as dereliction but others the apple of their eye. Whereas to nur ture harkens to a man made or rather induced stewardship, upbringing and preser ving of our cultivated wilderness. I follow Paul Shepheard’s definition of a cultivated wilderness, whereby wilderness is the “the world before humans appeared in it, and the cultivation is ever ything we’ve done to it since.” (The Cultivated Wilderness or, what is Landscape.

Paul Shepheard.)

I know the days of the idyllic countr y are naught but fragments now but we’re a nation of selfpreser vation or at least we used to be. I’m not standing on a soapbox demanding we all par take in annual Morris dancing around a maypole whilst members of the WI inspect and critique our quiches and sponges. I’m asking that we re ignite our passion for our Heritage before it really is tainted beyond repair. We still have the chance for a new harmony and have our own garden of ear thly delights.

It’s a case of how we live and how we might live! from Daniel Stilwell Part I Architectural Assistant in Conservation BA(hons) Architecture daniel.stillwell92@googlemail.com @danieljstilwell

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H E R I TA G E FUTURES: a letter from Rio

IMAGE courtesy of Graeme Brooker

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Dear EDGEcondition Heritage is a term that is often used to describe something old, long established, and considered to be of some value. The etymological root of the word is heir, used to describe the processes of inheriting possessions, as well as the passing on of heirlooms to others. In an urban context, buildings and cities are often described as sites of heritage.

They are places where impor tant events have happened, or they are cities where the urban fabric has been retained. However it is used, heritage is a word that describes some form of legacy: a thing that is passed down from generation to generation, a token that is left behind for others to do with as they see fit.

Inheritance and legacy are terms that are ver y much at the forefront of current urban planning debates in Brazil. In a ver y shor t space of time, Rio de Janeiro, where l am currently working on a project called the Creative Campus, will have hosted two of the largest global events any countr y or city can accommodate. In 2014 Brazil hosted the world cup, with Rio at the centre of the tournament.

In 2016 Rio will host the 31st Olympic games: the first city in South America to do so. Inbetween these two events, Rio celebrates its 450th anniversar y.

When the closing ceremony of the 2016 Olympic games finishes, the question is what will Rio inherit as the legacy of all of these events, and what will become the future heritages of the city?

The Creative Campus project is a pop-up learning space. It is a

flexible, fab-lab type workshop that can be located in any par t of the world. It connects educational institutions with both national and international creative industries and business. The campus is a space where knowledge, processes and cultures can be exchanged through the facilitating of an intensive and focussed workshop.

It is a space where some of the brightest young students from across the world are invited to par ticipate in a workshop on current urban issues. The first Creative Campus is based here in Rio and was launched on the first of March 2015. With generous suppor t from both the British Government and the UKTI/GREAT team, along with the Brazilian Government, five students from Pontifical Catholic University (P.U.C) in Rio, five from Middlesex University in London, and two from Spectaculu, a specialist Ar t and Design school, were invited to par ticipate in a ten-day laborator y in the National Librar y in central Rio. Four design briefs for the campus were formed from the analysis of extensive research under taken with the residents of the city. 1 – water security: 2 - mobility and the city: 3 - utilities and 4 - public transpor t. These were worked into Rio-focussed projects requiring the students to develop ideas on 1 – drainage and the filtration and separation of rubbish from the streets and the water systems, 2 – Bike lanes and moving around the city in a cyclist friendly manner, 3 – examining the unsightly encrustations of wires, cables and power lines attached to pylons and buildings all over the city, 4 - bus

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shelters and their role in the city.

The students worked on these projects for ten-days intermittently presenting their work at regular stages to a variety of stakeholders from the city.

Four key ideas were produced during the workshop. They were; ‘Samba-Rampa’: a water-filter ramp that can be retrofitted to street drains. It filters the rubbish from rainwater as it enters the drain system and assists wheelchair users (of which there are 900,000 of Rio’s 6.4 million residents) to scale the tall and uneven kerbs that separate the street from the pedestrians. ‘Mafua’ (organised chaos) is a modularised kinetic sculpture that was designed to change the perception of the wires and telegraph poles by wrapping them in commissioned ar tist designed cages that form new urban way-finders. The cages facilitated maintenance but discouraged ‘cats’: a major problem in Rio where in some extreme cases 30% of the utilities are obtained illegally by carioca’s attaching their own power cables to the existing lines. The Linhas Carioca (Carioca is the term used to describe a resident of Rio) is a graphic language system for bike lanes across the city. The street markings, and phone app, will inform the cyclist of the severity and danger of upcoming junctions.

It uses the universal three-colour red, amber, green systems, but in a series of floor markings that ranged from organic flowing (good - green), to amber and angular

(caution) to aggressive distor ted red (Danger). The bus system in Rio is chaotic. Drivers are paid in accordance to how many routes they complete, a system that leads to them driving fast and often dangerously, and there are ver y few published schedules. The bus shelters barely facilitate queuing, attract street vending and are notorious hot spots for crime. The ‘Planta Chuval’ is a stop that is designed to stimulate responsibility and promote neighbourhood investment by making the stops become small gardens. As well as new information systems the roof will filter water to suppor t a small kiosk, maintaining a level of security and suppor ting a flowers stall.

Prototypes of two of the projects (‘Samba-Rampa’ and ‘CariocaLineas’) have been constructed and will now be incubated at P.U.C .

Along with the testing and rolling out of the bike lanes across the city, one of the enduring ambitions of the workshop is to leave a legacy of the deployment of 1,000 samba-rampas in the city for 2016 and the Paralympics. The creative campus team will be presenting both of these ideas to the mayor of Rio in the near future in order to secure permissions and funding for their production and roll-out in the city. The creative campus workshop set out to create a legacy but more impor tantly develop an inheritance for the city, a future heritage for the Carioca’s of Rio. from Graeme Brooker Head of depar tment Fashion + interiors, Middlesex University (Room 410, Arpoador Inn, Ipanema) Creative campus on Facebook g.brooker@mdx.ac.uk @autopilotgraeme

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IMAGE:

IMAGE courtesy of Graeme Brooker

F E AT U R E S

O P E N D AY S & C U LT U R E N I G H T S by Arthur Acheson Architect, Civic Planner Belfast

Across 50 countries which have signed the European Cultural Convention, European Heritage Days (EHD) are organised jointly through the Council of Europe and the European Commission.

The concept began in France in 1984 with Open Doors Day (La JournĂŠe Portes Ouvertes). In England there are Heritage Open Days, in Scotland there are Doors Open Days and Wales uses the term Open Doors Days.

I opened Finnebrogue House in County Down in September 1997, during the first two European Heritage Open Days (EHOD), as the scheme is known in Northern Ireland.

The house was one of 125 properties which opened in 1997; each was visited by an average of 100 people. By 2014, with 415 properties open for at least one of the two days, the visitor numbers at each property averaged over 180.

EHOD is organised by the devolved government through its Northern Ireland Environment Agency (NIEA) which produces an amazing piece of software - a detailed booklet of hundreds

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of descriptions and opening arrangements. You can find the 2014 booklet here.

In addition to providing brief descriptive details of each participating heritage building or place, the booklet offers information about special events and details of the concept and the organisers. Having such excellent software and only using it for two days a year seems a waste and of course, even with a helicopter, it would be impossible to visit all the properties during just two days.

The Federation for Ulster Local Studies Limited lists over thirty local historical societies in Northern Ireland. Typical activities include regular lectures, meetings, publications and visits.

Built heritage is tangible local history.

Aspects of the Northern Ireland curriculum encourage teachers and children to include built heritage in their studies.

In history for example, the curriculum includes the study of: historical sites and old buildings

in the locality; different buildings and their features now and in the past; the effect of people on the natural and built environment over time; and the life of a famous person, family or building in the past. NIEA has produced Key Stage 1 and 2 resources about learning from historic buildings.

Developing the European Heritage Open Days software would link education more closely with co-operative owners to greatly increase the learning resource.

NIEA also produces an annual calendar of Wonderful Days Out. Some modest design input to the process of organising the Open Days could facilitate contacts between owners of heritage properties and the local historical societies, environmental groups, schools and others whom we know are passionate about their heritage and want to celebrate and present it. Inviting owners of built heritage to have their contact details included in the European Heritage Open Days information booklet would connect them to potentially interested people and groups.

Augmenting the two annual Open Days organised by government, therefore, independent visits could be arranged for specialist study or appreciation of the built heritage. Local historical societies, environmental organisations, schools, further and higher education providers and individuals are all likely to have interests in making such contacts. In addition to special interest groups and individuals with whom the software could link co-operative owners, more public Heritage Open Days locally organised by interested

groups and owners - would improve access to the heritage and increase its appreciation, as well as benefiting the groups and owners.

Presenting the heritage asset as part of the working of a place is quite usual. Historic churches often remain open for visits during and beyond church services, particularly in acknowledged tourist destinations. Distilleries and breweries, many in heritage buildings, arrange public visits which do not interfere with production, increasing awareness of local industries and allowing people to appreciate the architecture. Culture Nights open buildings that are normally closed up in the evenings, presenting built heritage as part of the place’s character and increasing awareness of its importance.

Belfast attracts over 50,000 additional visitors on this one night per year, far exceeding the daily throughput of any of Northern Ireland’s most famous tourist attractions. There are clear opportunities to further connect Open Days and Culture Nights to benefit owners and visitors.

Heritage buildings therefore generate economic activity.

Increasing access with cooperative owners can encourage greater visitor numbers and develop the owners’ experience and skills in hosting, welcoming people and interpreting the assets. The long term viability of the heritage properties improves with each visit, making both buildings and visits more sustainable in the long term.

The booklet’s 2015 update could introduce owners to visitors

and encourage passionate communities of interest, such as historical and environmental groups, to be pro-active in their connections with the owners and managers of local built heritage, increasing its accessibility and popularity. A lightly augmented booklet could widen the scope for owners and managers of listed buildings to develop their viability.

Visitors paying a small charge create economic activity and better experiences are generated by increased appreciation of historic architecture. Heritage is regularly rated highly among the list of reasons for people to visit and increasing accessibility improves the reputation of the sector and the wider visitor experience in Northern Ireland.

Seventeen years of European Heritage Open Days in Northern Ireland have steadily increased public accessibility of listed buildings. Almost six times as many people visited last year as during the first year of opening under the scheme. With the cooperation of owners who wish to share the histories of their properties with greater numbers of people, the 2015 Open Days booklet could do more than provide information for two days of visits. Previous booklets are freely available on the internet and with minor additional information the 2015 edition could become the popular link between private buildings and public appreciation.

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BEYOND PEBBLEDASH LEARNING FROM DUBLIN’S DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURAL HERITAGE

by BLAITHIN QUINN BArch, BSc (Architectural Science) BA(hons) Visual Ar ts Practice MA Visual Ar t Education Independent Architect - Ar tist LinkedIN blaithinannquinn@gmail.com @transcolonia IMAGES COURTESY OF ROS KAVANAGH

Beyond Pebbledash was a project initiated in 2014 by Dublin based urban planner Paul Kearns and Tel-Aviv based artist-architect Motti Ruimi.

The project consisted of an architectural installation, a book and an extensive public engagement programme, which drew on one aspect of Dublin’s domestic architectural heritage as a starting point for a creative exploration of challenges and design opportunities related to contemporary urban living.

Beyond Pebbledash celebrated an often-overlooked icon of Dublin’s architectural heritage, the pebbledash house. Built between the 1940’s and 1960’s

by Dublin Corporation (now Dublin City Council) in areas of Dublin including Cabra, Crumlin and Ballyfermot, these two-storey, terraced family houses provided (and still provide) homes for tens of thousands of Dubliners.

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The Lord Mayor of Dublin, Christy Burke noted that the Beyond Pebbledash project was “a wonderful celebration of the great tradition of high quality social housing in Ireland.” He suggested that we can “learn from this great tradition to develop a truly great, liveable and inclusive city.” 1 According to Ruimi and Kearns “the construction of tens of thousands of ‘pebbledash homes’ represents one of the most visionary, ambitious and successfully enduring legacies of the Irish state, it literally imagined and, critically, delivered, new living possibilities.” They state, “the challenge today is perhaps not so different. A Dublin housing crisis is gathering pace; there is an urgent shortage of desirable homes. The answer, is not simply to build more suburban homes further out, but to imagine something different, a greener, safer, cleaner, more family friendly, liveable inner city.” 2 Crucially, the

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visionary energy and the ambition that drove the creation of this architectural legacy is inspiring and relevant when viewed in the context of today’s social and economic challenges.

The Beyond Pebbledash architectural installation (by Ruimi and Kearns, 2014) was a full scale reconstruction of a typical 1940’s pebbledash house, consisting of a fully built front façade, with a tubular steel framework behind to represent the plan and section of the dwelling. The installation was on display in the main courtyard at the National Museum, Collins Barracks, Dublin (September 2014 - January 2015) and was intended to act as a catalyst to drive discussion about the future of urban living in Ireland. The artists’ were essentially concerned with the everyday architecture of the ‘house’ and ‘home’ and how this is valued by Irish society. During the public engagement programme, the installation became a starting point to stimulate debate about current, urgent and widely relevant national issues related to urban living and the built environment, including highdensity living, ghost estates, rent control, homelessness and the inadequate provision of social and affordable housing. “Beyond Pebbledash is both a celebration of an overlooked icon of Dublin

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(Irish) domestic architecture and a design driven discussion on the future of Dublin urbanism.” 3 The engagement programme was a public invitation to reimagine the ‘home’ and to inspire discussion about new design possibilities for urban living. In order to reach a wide and diverse audience the programme was initiated in a multidisciplinary context: National Museum of Ireland (Education and Outreach); Dublin City Council (Planning, Arts, Heritage, Architecture); and Redrawing Dublin (Ruimi and Kearns). An interdisciplinary team of architects, artists, curators and educators collaborated to devise and deliver the programme: this author, Blaithin Quinn (artist, architect); Orla Murphy (architect, academic); Tara Kennedy (artist, architect); Jo Anne Butler (artist, architect); and Lynn McGrane (education specialist). Ruairi O’Cuiv, Public Art Manager with Dublin City Council, was the overall project manager and curator. The engagement programme, which was funded by the Arts Council of Ireland (Engaging with Architecture Scheme, 2014), acted as a spatial and temporal framework within which a series of events could take place, including a workshop series for young people, an urban party, a symposium, a contemporary dance performance

and an exhibition. There was a particular focus on participation, collaboration, user-generated urbanism and activism, under the central theme of urban living.

This article will now focus on one aspect of the public engagement programme in more detail, the participatory workshop series for young people. In total, the interdisciplinary engagement team delivered twenty four 1.5 hour workshop sessions with nine different schools and three youth groups from Dublin’s inner city and suburbs, in an informal education setting at the National Museum of Ireland. We facilitated participants’ ownership over ideas, giving young people a voice with regard to the shaping of urban fabric in the future. The focus was on young personcentered work and on facilitating empowerment through authentic creative expression. The Beyond Pebbledash installation was a starting point for exploration throughout.

The workshop series consisted of three phases: Phase 1: ‘With Voice’ (Delivered by Tara Kennedy and Jo Anne Butler) Through a series of voice recordings, young people described their ideas for the future of urban living and design.

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Phase 2: ‘Matchbox City’ and ‘Plus-1’ (Delivered by Blaithin Quinn) This workshop phase facilitated a transformation of participant’s ideas expressed through discussion into 3-dimensional spatial designs, exploring the ‘house’ and ‘home’ with a particular focus on scale and density.

Phase 3: ‘Manifesto’, ‘Dear Beyond Pebbledash’ and ‘Plus-1’ (Delivered by Orla Murphy) This workshop phase linked participants’ ideas about urban living to the greater urban context, exploring ideas through discussion, drawing and text.

The voice recordings and the processes explored during the participatory workshop series evolved into an exhibition at the National Museum in December 2014, curated by Ruairi O’Cuiv.

The energy and ambition behind the construction of the pebbledash housing stock in Dublin is inspiring. Living units were constructed on a scale to meet demand, and delivered new possibilities for living between the 1940’s and 1960’s. How can we translate this dynamic vision into a contemporary urbanism to inspire solutions for the current housing crisis? What can we learn from this aspect of Dublin’s architectural heritage?

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Additional weblinks to Beyond Pebbledash documentation: (All video documentation by Paddy Cahill) Culture Night, September 2014 An outdoor living room with a DJ, in Collins Barracks for Culture Night Video Documentation.

Urban Party, October 2014 House and Home, Living in the City Culture Night, September 2014 An outdoor living room with a DJ, in Collins Barracks for Culture Night Video Documentation.

Urban Party, October 2014 House and Home, Living in the City Twenty culturally diverse participants including politicians, architects, inner city dwellers and young people each spoke for three minutes on the subject of “House and Home; Living in the City.”

Video Documentation.

Symposium, November 2014 The Challenges of Delivering a World Class (Inner) City Speakers included: Emily Logan, Frances Ruane, Jim Keogan and Annraí O’Toole. Chaired by Kieran Rose. Video Documentation.

References: 1 Dublin City Council. 2014.You are invited to the launch of Beyond Pebbledash. [27 August 2014] 2

Kearns, P. & Ruimi. M. Beyond Pebbledash. Gandon Editions. Dublin.

2014. p.11-12

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National Museum of Ireland. 2014.

Beyond Pebbledash. [17 October 2014]

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HERITAGE & LIVABILITY IN A DIVIDED CITY: LUCCA, ITALY by Aisling Joyce Bachelor in Architecture aislingjoyce@gmail.com

Its mid-September in Tuscany, Italy and the narrow winding streets of Lucca’s historic centre are bustling with tourists. The annual Procession of the Cross is due to take place the coming Saturday and there is a sense of anticipation in the air. Workers from the Municipality are busy fixing candle-holders to the street facades of the brightly rendered buildings while tourists weave in and around their ladders along herringbone stone paved streets, moving from one beautifully preserved shop front to another, admiring the Tuscan leather bags and sampling various flavours of gelatti. The sea of bodies flow through the streets and flood Lucca’s Piazzas where their human scale is drowned by another Romanesque Church. Lucca is steeped in heritage; culturally, spatially and socially and it is easy to understand the inherent charm that draws the hoards of tourists throughout the year.

The Luminare Procession is not only greatly anticipated by the visitors but also held in high regard by the local Luchessi. “It is a celebration of Luchessi Del Monde”; a shoemaker explains, “the Luchessi population who have emigrated return especially for this event. Both the Inner Luchessi [few of them that are left] and the Outer Luchesssi come inside the walls for the procession.”

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any categorisation of Inner and Outer Lucca. These identities soon became apparent from speaking to locals and I quickly came to learn the clear differences between them.

The dividing feature One of Lucca’s most iconic features is a massive piece of Renaissance infrastructure, The Wall. The Wall was built to serve as a declaration of authority and symbol of status. High and impenetrable, it was to act as a deterrent, 12m high, 30m wide at its base and just over 4km in perimeter. Today the wall has a great social significance as a circular park. It has become a strong identity for Lucca essentially generating a city so wrapped in its history it is physically bound by it.

The urban structure of Inner Lucca has generated a distinct urban typology that clearly shows the transitions of the various phases of the city’s development.

During the 12th century silk trade and banking activities led to an increase in economic and social growth and gave way to Tower Houses. These homes of wealthy merchants grew out out the dense fabric of the old Roman Centre.

Inner Lucca reached its peak economic development in terms of architectural development and urban structure by the end of the 17th century. The narrow winding Roman streets became enclosed

as the dense urban fabric grew denser. Houses grew together, enclosing winding streets and construction commenced on The Wall, and what has become one of Lucca’s most iconic pieces of infrastructure.

In the late 1800s, a divide began to grow between the old historic centre of Lucca and the newer suburbs outside the gates. Family farms were subdivided from one generation to the next. Smaller clustered settlements grew along a network of arteries radiating out from Inner Lucca’s gates and merged to produce a large uncontrolled mass of low-density urban development that we have today. This gave way to Outer Lucca, the “Living Suburbs”.

In this way, Lucca’s urban form demonstrates a fascinating example of a resilient city, which has undergone successive transformations and gradual and systematic urban growth. It is also interesting in its own right from the outlook of the history of town-planning, both for the trend of development, indicator of the territory’s specific economic and social conditions, and for the architectural styles and urban structures that distinguish Inner and Outer Lucca.

Today Inner and Outer Lucca exist as separate but interdependent entities. The percentage ratio

Lucca, Italy. Image courtesy of Aisling Joyce

of inhabitants that live in the respective areas is significant: with only 10 per cent of citizens still living in Inner Lucca. In the 1950s this figure was approximately 40 per cent.

The old stone buildings of Inner Lucca lack modern facilities and inhibit accessibility and usability especially for vulnerable categories of society, which constitute the majority of its inhabitants today. This lack of modern infrastructure and restricted vehicular access in Inner Lucca proved too much of a hindrance for Luchessi.

The prospect of newer, larger, brighter and more accessible accommodation offered in the area outside of Lucca’s walls, proved more appealing, especially to those with young families using strollers, shopping bags and frontof-house parking.

Lucca’s citizens have been migrating outside the wall, but retaining their old residences

inside the walls for the purposes of B&B or apartments for tourist rental. For this reason Inner Lucca experiences temporal and relatively short-term transitional accommodation. This loss of original Luchessi inhabitants from within the walls is proving detrimental to Lucca’s cultural and social identity.

In order to preserve historic Lucca’s architectural heritage, certain measures and policies were established by Lucca’s Municipality in 2004, including a structural plan and zoning regulations. These were aimed at the safeguard and improvement of the cultural heritage. Only conservation renovation works were authorised. Moreover, in 2006 Lucca became a World Heritage Site.

The combination of these factors have inhibited Lucca’s inhabitants but also the retailers. Larger stores, offices and services moved outside the walls to larger more

accessible sites, leaving the smaller postcard shop units to tourist traders such as Gelatti, Leather shops and restaurants.

It is interesting to note that Outer Lucca remains as important to the region’s daily life as the historic centre. These areas, while very different, benefit from a symbiotic relationship. Today, as a UNESCO Wold Heritage Site, Inner Lucca relies almost entirely on tourism and the service sector.

Online resources such as Air B&B and Booking.com have enabled Luchessi to rent their apartments to international tourists yearround. Income generated through tourist rentals allow Luchessi to afford the high maintenance cost associated with the upkeep of old stone and brick buildings.

That weekend I attended the Procession of the Cross along with the mass of tourists and the Luchessi themselves to experience first-hand a tradition that attracts not only people from around the world but even the Outer.

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RE-INTERPRETATION OF THE BUCOLIC IRISH COTTAGE by Roisin McDonald BSc, MArch, ARB, RIBA PhD Student Queen’s University Belfast IMAGES COURTESY OF ROISIN MCDONALD

I am an architect, researcher and rural dweller, raised in a bungalow in the countryside of Northern Ireland. The field of rural architectural design (pun intended) not surprisingly, is one in which I have been interested throughout my architectural education, and now too professionally. My current research examines domestic architectural design within the Irish rural landscape – more specifically the Design Guides which aim to shape and influence it. As part of initial investigations, an overview of the historic evolution of the traditional Irish cottage was mapped against events which significantly altered its design and aesthetic, so much so that the typical Irish rural dwelling house of today, bears little to no resemblance to its predecessor. A wholesale change in the rural built environment

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is evident, here I hope to raise the debate and create an awareness of the importance of good architectural design and the consequences if we are to continue as we have done in recent times.

Ireland, the land of saints and scholars, a place steeped in culture and folklore which evokes ideas of unspoilt landscapes and thatched cottages. This romantic imagery epitomises an idealised Ireland, a picture postcard featuring bucolic Irish cottages which are reminiscent of De Valera’s vision for Ireland – a land whose countryside would be bright with cosy homesteads.

Although an idealised vision, Ireland’s landscape was indeed, once enriched by its heritage of farmhouses and outbuildings (O’Reilly, 2006). The thatched

cottage is representative of local building tradition and exemplifies the once rural vernacular. It has become somewhat of a national symbol, an evocative typology which is imbedded in the collective consciousness of our society as the archetypical comfortable house (Stevens, 2007). It evolved in the manner in which the hearth was the central element. It was typically a modest building, of simple form and proportions, single storey, rectangular in plan and one room deep (Aalen, 2011).

Traditionally the occupants were also their builders who built in a language of construction that was shared by their community (Sterrett et al, 2005).

Features were dictated by harsh environmental conditions and the availability or indeed restrictions of local materials, thus regional,

IMAGE: Postcard – Beautiful Ireland: Thatched Farmhouse

local and site specific variations existed. The resultant was a product of the landscape, a building which seamlessly integrates into its backdrop, as described the renowned ethnologist Campbell, “even as a tree or rock.”

a series of plans for people wanting to build their own house.

The book which sold over half a million copies was heavily criticized by Irish Times journalist Frank McDonald who coined the term ‘Bungalow Blitz’, a pun on the title.

The reality of today’s Irish landscape falls short of the romantic imagery portrayed in picture postcards. As one travels through the countryside, evidence of the vernacular tradition, one which responds so carefully to site and context, seems to have been abandoned in favour of the standardised plan and house type – a “consumer article” (Stevens 2007) which are replicated throughout the countryside. This divergence from was amplified in the 70s and 80s by the publication of the Jack Fitzsimmons book ‘Bungalow Bliss’ which provided

The debate is vast and varied, with many opposed and many for.

Architecture critic Shane O’Toole expresses his concern, referring to the proliferation of bungalows as a “chaotic sprawl of ribbon development which we Irish have scribbled all over much of our dishevelled landscape.” (O’Toole, 2003). Whilst McNamara notes that for one third of the Irish population they are the preferred dwelling.

The Celtic Tiger has also left a lasting impression, perhaps more so than as than the former

expresses his concern, referring to the proliferation of bungalows as a “chaotic sprawl of ribbon development which we Irish have scribbled all over much of our dishevelled landscape.” (O’Toole, 2003). Whilst McNamara notes that for one third of the Irish population they are the preferred dwelling.

The Celtic Tiger has also left a lasting impression, perhaps more so than as than the former bungalow bliss or ‘blitz’ era. A booming economy saw sites sold off by farmers, in turn dwellings grew in size, scale and number.

They commanded prominent locations and were signifiers of wealth, status symbols to be viewed by both neighbours and their urban counterparts. The bungalow was thus superseded by what would become the McMansion or “Muck Mansion”

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IMAGE: Traditional 19th century rural dwelling - Drumsaragh Road, Kilrea, Co.Derry (which became the authors house following renovation in 1985)

bungalow bliss or ‘blitz’ era. A booming economy saw sites sold off by farmers, in turn dwellings grew in size, scale and number.

They commanded prominent locations and were signifiers of wealth, status symbols to be viewed by both neighbours and their urban counterparts. The bungalow was thus superseded by what would become the McMansion or “Muck Mansion” as described by Aalen. It which would take the form of “a twostorey house faced in either red brick or stone storey, with protruding conservatory and a detached garage.” (Aelan, 2011, p.157) The scale of change is inescapable. Over the past decade hundreds of thousands of one-off dwellings have been granted planning permission in Northern Ireland and Ireland.

The pressure the countryside has faced is unprecedented and despite the more the economic downturn; single dwellings have and continue to prevail. Thus, in order to ensure a future for the Irish rural landscape and its built heritage, quality of design is paramount. Indeed examples of rural dwellings of quality design

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do exist, however sadly they are still few and far between.

References Aelan, F. (2011) Atlas of the Irish Rural Landscape, Cork, Cork University Press

I do not nor would not suggest that the answer to is to revert back to the cottage, indeed these buildings are perceived as being synonymous with hardship and poverty. We live in contemporary society and thus dwellings should reflect our needs. However, generic typologies and up-scaled dwellings borrowed from external influences offer little in the way of response to site context. They lose their Irish-ness in favour of a globalised consumer product.

It is not just a matter of taste.

The benefits of quality design cannot be underestimated. As noted by Brett and Jones (2007), “there are very good reasons why ‘traditional’ buildings are the way they are” thus what is necessary is that we learn and build upon the lessons of our past, to create a building tradition through a reinterpretation of the bucolic Irish cottage; one which embodies the principals of the rural vernacular, facilitates the construction of sustainable dwellings which harmonise with our landscape and contribute to a rural built heritage which is at present rapidly diminishing.

Gailey, A. (1984) Rural houses of the north of Ireland, Edinburgh, John Donald Publishers.

Kennedy, Brian P. (1987) The Traditional Irish Rural Dwelling, In: Old cultures in new worlds. 8th ICOMOS General Assembly and International Symposium.

Programme report - Compte rendu. US/ ICOMOS, Washington, pp. 645-652.

McNamara, A. (2002) Bungalow Blitz: Another History of Irish architecture, Calgary, The Banff Centre, O Toole, S. (2003) On marked and abandoned ground: An introduction to the work of eight Irish architects, Architecture + Urbanism, no.397, p.112 - 113 O’Reilly, B. (2006) Traditional buildings on Irish farms, Kilkenny, The Heritage Council Shaffrey, M. (1990) Irish Cottages, Clarkson Potter Sterret et al, (2005) Planning in Ireland and Beyond: Multidisciplinary Essays in honour of John V. Greer, p.139-168, Belfast, Queen’s University Belfast Stevens, D. (2007) Rural: Open to all, beginners welcome, Leitrim, Mermaid Turbulence

IMAGE: Bungalow in the countryside, Co.Cork

IMAGE: Stone-faced one-off dwelling in countryside, Co.Cork

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THE LISTER STEPS

CARNEGIE COMMUNITY HUB PROJECT by Kerry Massheder-Rigby MA, PCIFA Heritage Development Officer

by Alison Doran BA(hons) Architectural Assistant

www.listerstepshub.co.uk www.facebook.com/listerstepscarnegiecommunityhub Kerr y.Massheder-Rigby@listersteps.co.uk @livuniMassheder @listerstepshub

www.listerstepshub.co.uk adoran9005@hotmail.co.uk @Alison_Doran @listerstepshub

IMAGES COURTESY OF LISTER STEPS HUB PROJECT

The former Andrew Carnegie Library in Liverpool, known locally as Lister Drive Library, is a Grade II listed building that served the community as a library for over 100 years.It was the first branch library in Liverpool to be funded by the American Philanthropist Andrew Carnegie and was one of many to be designed by Liverpool Corporation Surveyor Thomas Shelmerdine.Constructed in 1903 -1905 the two storey building features a large glass dome and an octagonal tower, and is constructed of Ruabon bricks with sandstone dressing and slate roof tiles.

Closed by Liverpool City Council (LCC) in 2006 due to health and safety concerns the building has remained unoccupied due to the

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prohibitive cost of repairs. While vacant, the building has suffered from vandalism, neglect and theft. Items stolen include lead flashings, the roof lights, glazing and feature ridge tiles, which has resulted in substantial rainwater ingress which has severely damaged the timber structure, internal decorative plasterwork and joinery resulting in dry rot throughout the building.

Lister Steps, is a charity offering childcare, play services and family support, currently running their services from portakabins on land adjacent to the former library. In 2012, Lister Steps was awarded ‘Preferred Developer’ statusfrom LCC to allow them to progress their plans to regenerate the abandoned building. Shortly afterwards Lister Steps were awarded initial support, including a development grant of £224,000 from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) who, once a complete bid is submitted in 2016, will consider awarding the full grant of £4.5m to enable Lister Steps to bring the building back into use as a hub for the community. If successful, the project will result in the removal of the former

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library from Liverpool’s Buildings at Risk Register and return it to full community use.

The development stage of the Lister Steps Carnegie Community Hub project, which is ongoing at the time of publishing, includes funding of £100,000 from LCC to carry out emergency holding works to make the building watertight, prevent further decayand carry out investigations into the extent of the damage.

This work started in August 2014 and will continue into early 2015.

Although the building is unsafe for visitors, the contractors on site have allowed Lister Steps to photograph and video the progress of the works, allowing them to create a log of the buildings development which is then accessible by the members of the community.

The HLF development stage is giving the team at Lister Steps the opportunity to run community consultation events, enabling local people to actively contribute to the redesign and development process.The project has also run a number of

events to engage the community with their heritage and explore their thoughts, opinions and feelings about the Tuebrook neighbourhood, which has received an overwhelming amount of support and interest from the local and wider community.

In October 2014, Lister Steps celebrated National Poetry Day with a local writing group, North End Writers. Participants read poems surrounding the theme of ‘remembrance’ in the grounds of the former library, in a bid to help those involved to remember the library as a core of the community. During October and November 2014 Lister Steps hosted a ‘Theatre in Democracy’ performance. A project team of Community Drama students from the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts ran a number of drop-in workshops, aimed at exploring how residents felt about Tuebrook. Through a creative performance, Say it Loud, delivered to LCC, the community were given the opportunity to converse with the decision makers.

An important part of the HLF

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development phase includes creating a detailed activity plan setting out how Lister Steps will engage the community in their heritage throughout the project and beyond. During the preparations for the activity plan it has become apparent that the community responses to the project illustrate how important the building is to the community as a place of engagement, education and local heritage.

One participant commented ‘To find a way of bringing back to life such a beautiful building with historical value helps respect and value our past and future as a community. It is really important.’

Another commented that regenerating and re-using historic buildings is important because ‘...it gives a sense of community cohesion - communities have deep seated associations with these buildings - regeneration will contribute to the local economy and act as a catalyst for improving the local area.’

And finally, when asked if and why the building was important to them one participant replied ‘The history, the scale and beauty of the architecture, the local connections with people, the sorrow at seeing it decay over the years from once being wonderful.’

The activities that take place during the HLF delivery phase of the project will depend upon the requests and enthusiasm of those that engage in the development phase consultation process. Current suggestions include: archaeological test pitting, historic building recording, a local history book, heritage trails and talks, an oral history project and a history themed exhibition. These activities will be planned and delivered to engage the community with their heritage- to encourage a deeper level of understanding, respect and attachment to a place that was historically the centre of the community.

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FROM PERSONAL EXPERIENCE

HERITAGE TODAY:

A PERSONAL PORTRAIT by Jennifer Foraksis Architect and Founder HOOP Architecture www.studiohoop.com @MakeHoop IMAGES COURTESY OF JENNIFER FORAKSIS

IMAGE:

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FIVE MINUTES TO THE BEACH

Being ‘Greek’, or more accurately being a ‘Hellene’, should offer bragging rights. We gave the world the keys to civilisation didn’t we? Democracy, philosophy, politics, language, theatre, mathematics, thinkers, writers...

And the David .v. Goliath analogy applies here too, a small country courageously succeeds in fighting for independence on national and international scales; following the emergence of the Greek state (1770-1831) from Ottoman rule and the period of nation building (1831-1922) Greece (the Hellenic Republic) played a vital role in World War II, survived the legacy of civil war (1950-1974) and consolidated a new democracy.

It’s a pretty impressive record isn’t it, but perhaps modesty is a more endearing character trait.

The ‘Greek’ identity has been bittersweet for me. As a child Greece represented sunshine, ‘oikoyenia’ (family), faith (the traditions of the Greek Orthodox Church) and the joy of ‘parea‘ (gathering of friends purely for the enjoyment of each other’s company); as an adolescent it was stereotypes and the endless embarrassment of mispronounced names and boisterous family members i.e. teenage torture (think ‘My Big Fat Greek Wedding’). By 2004 with the combination of maturity, and a stellar year of UEFA Euro football and Summer Olympic Games in Athens, pride was at last on the horizon. And then BAM! the ‘crisis’; sadness and human suffering in graphic technicolour on the world stage.

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IMAGE:

IMAGE: ACROPOLIS, ALWAYS JUST THERE. MAGICAL

The image of Greece and the Greeks somehow got stuck in the late twentieth century. In Britain it was as if the slide show had paused on a still of 1960‘s Aristotle Onassis, Maria Callas or Zorba the Greek (1964). Maybe for some it rolled-on towards 1970‘s Demis Roussos or Shirley Valentine (1989) but that was it. The 2004 Olympic Games provided an opportunity to reframe this image and to move forwards loudly and proudly, and it did to some extent. Until the economic ‘crisis’; shame superseded pride and humility became the expected norm.

As a consequence of the crisis a unique nation, a society of 11.03 million individuals (2013), was reduced to a harsh one-dimensional stereotype.

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The figures are shocking, 28% unemployment (2013), youth unemployment up to 60% and national debt up to 170% of GDP. The relentless austerity that ensued caused economic meltdown, structural instability and human distress. What of the society’s fundamental beliefs in the joy of life, traditional family values and their culture of ‘filoxenia’ (beyond hospitality this is ‘love of strangers’)? What of their homeland’s exceptional beauty and abundant resources?

When credibility is shattered it can be a long road ‘back’, but it is possible; as Peter Economides says ‘Apple did it!.’ 1

the past, the story one of a hard working people transcending their Byzantine and Hellenic histories and mastering their futures. Behind the current political jargon is the emergence of positive new values. The networked-young are revolting against the corrupt elites and many are returning from studies abroad to take on the roles of custodians and stewards of their homeland. The global outlook is evident, and necessary, as the challenges of earthquakes, economic shifts, heatwaves, high unemployment, riot and civil unrest threaten the population of the city (5 million, 2013).

My personal adventure is as a native-born Londoner of Athenian parentage; Modern Athens is my heritage. A city inherited from

In the global twenty-first century our identity is based less on where we come from and who our family are; instead our

IMAGE:

identities are increasingly bound up with our jobs. We long for dignity and respect, we want to be understood and we seek (to create) a society of people with whom we can identify; this is our common ground.

Self reliance, creativity and a willingness to experiment are not new to the Athenians; Could looking back at our heritage help to inform the future? American historian Howard Zinn said that “You learn about today when you learn about history’’.

In the fifth century B.C. Greece was made up of many smaller states each centred around a city. The physical geography, the mountainous coastal nature of the land, and a history of tribal migrations from the north to the

Cafe in old Nafplio. Designed by hEAd. Photo by Christina Panagiotara

new and fertile lands in the south resulted in city states which were built around fortified hill-tops (‘acropolis’).

The Athenian Acropolis has been settled since at least Neolithic times, in the fourteenth century B.C. a Mycenaean royal palace stood upon the hill, later the site served sacred and religious functions, then a memorial to war and later a new temple. Finally in the 450s B.C., after the Persian destruction, the Athenians built the extraordinary buildings that we see today. Built under the ‘populist’ statesman, orator and general Pericles the Athenian Acropolis became known as the educational and cultural centre of Ancient Greece.

Many of the terms in our

everyday vocabulary are borrowed from the Ancient Greeks. Amongst them politics (from polis, meaning city-state or community) and democracy (from demokratia, literally people-power). The ‘demos’, that is the people (or perhaps the masses, depending on your reading of the historical theories) of Ancient Athens belonged to one the oldest, most stable and most radical of the hundreds of Greek democracies in their time.

To put this into context, by the fourth century B.C. Athens was one of circa 1,500 Greek ‘cities’, some of which were monarchies or oligarchies. Eligibility for democratic government was not for everyone; for example we know that Athenian women were excluded from the political elite.

2 Nevertheless, the ‘power to the 33

people’ principle, that is power to the poor, was the guiding rule of the Athenian’s citizen self-government; and democracy flourished with the exception of a few ‘incidents’ until 322 in Athens, and elsewhere in the Greek-world until the Romans arrived.

The Ancient City states sought to be resilient. They were often rivals and the enthusiasm for activities such as athletics and the Olympic Games are thought to have stemmed from the need for a physically fit, strong and skilled population able to defend against their enemies. Their activities fostered participation, community cohesion and pride.

We think about stability and equilibrium being the desired state but that’s often what got us here in the first place; being able to self regulate, bounce back and adapt is key. Governance is what it comes down to, and in voting for the anti-austerity Syriza government the people have installed a new (and experimental) governance. Judith Rodin lists the five characteristics of resilience (in cities or people) as i) Awareness ii) Redundancy/ diversity iii) Integration (non silo mentality) iv) Self regulation and v) Adaptability + speed.

Rodin highlights that sometimes it the slow burning stresses that make us more vulnerable when the shock occurs. She cites examples such as New Orleans’ Hurricane Katrina when the city subsequently sought to foster community cohesion and a participatory approach.

And that has led to not only recovery but revitalisation too. 3 In Athens documentary filmmaker Myrto Papadogeorgou from the City of Errors initiative asks for school children to be engaged in interactive civic education lessons to show them the importance of playing an active part in their communities. ‘When you love your city, your city loves you

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GOING TO WORK

back,’ she argues.

Instructive too is the ethical discourse of the Ancient Athenians. Eudaimonia is a philosophy characterising ‘wellbeing’ or ‘human-flourishing’ as of essential value and the objective of a ‘well-lived’ and complete life. Sometimes associated with ‘individualism’ it strikes a chord with the way in which we live today. Explore further and we learn that Aristotle spoke of ‘arete’ (virtue) and the eudaimon life as one of “virtuous activity in accordance with reason”, delve further still and we find that Epicurus associated virtue with happiness. Over two thousand years later ‘people-power’ is back in the news as we search for greater equality. Howard Zinn argued for equality through ‘democratic socialism’, he called for an economic system where the motive is the welfare of the people, not corporate profit. 4 Athens has a vibrant civic history, and there are a lot of questions to be explored, amongst my own is can civic workshops and civicmaking be a restorative activity today? How can we be active citizens? Civic participation and

grass routes engagement are global narratives, this isn’t ‘just’ a Greek thing.

The contribution is significant.

In Athens there is a raw honesty and a palpable energy in the air. The spirit and passion that was evident in 2012 and 2013 is evolving and citizens are working together to reclaim their collective identity. Through social movements and facilitated by the internet, the people are cutting out the middle men and speaking directly. As you wander through the city you will stumble upon inspirational new alongside extraordinary old; street art, start-ups, entrepreneurial initiatives, co-working hubs, relevant innovations in technology and social change and grass routes design activism are thriving.

The Hellenes and the Hellenic Republic can be proud of their heritage. Gr-exit or not, Hellenism and the ideas of freemarket, critique and peoplepower live on.

IMAGE: ATHENIAN RIVIERA, MY MORNING RUN

References 1 Economides, P. (2012) Reload Greece 2012: Peter Economides Re-Branding Greece Video.

2 Thorpe, V (2015) Caitlin Moran: how to be a Renaissance Woman.

The Guardian 15. 03. 2015. This inequality is not exclusive to the Ancient Athenians. Our own twentyfirst century democracies exist too; Caitlin Moran’s comment “It’s difficult to see the glass ceiling. What we need is for more birds to fly above it and shit all over it, so we can see it properly.” makes the point vividly.

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Rodin, J, 2015, The Resilience Dividend, Profile Books Ltd, London.

4 Zinn, H, 1999. How Can History Help Us in the Future? Howard Zinn on A People’s History of the United States (1999) Video.

Bibliography Rodin, J (2015) The Resilience Dividend, Profile Books Ltd, London.

Zinn, H (1999) How Can History Help Us in the Future? Howard Zinn on A People’s History of the United States. Video.

Kavada, Anastasia (2013) Internet cultures and protest movements: the cultural links between strategy, organizing and online communication.

In: Mediation and protest movements.

Intellect, London, pp. 75-94.

“Anybody can be a Hellene, by his heart, his mind, his spirit.. “ Socrates.

Footnotes 1. Politeia 2 is a platform which supports community engagement.

Politeia 2 held an international meeting on 21st March 2015 discussing neighbourhood communication http://politeia2. org/diethnis-sinantisi-simmetochipoliton-schediazontas-apo-tin-platiatis-gitonias-eos-to-sintagma-tischoras/ 3. Atenistas is a volunteer group of over 5000 Athenians undertaking actions to reconstruct Athens of today. Activities include anti-tagging campaigns, free archaeological tours for local people and visitors and humanitarian interventions.

hosting the Acropolis exhibits has been built, a new contemporary art museum, the new National Opera and Library complexes are underway and a new City Park is being created on the Athenian Riveria. Alongside these architectural works the city council have gained prizes for their humanitarian activity including the Bloomberg Philanthropy sustainable development and the EFTA solidarity award and community groups are flourishing. Athens is a city looking forwards.

4. Notions of politics, economy and infrastructure are in flux yet this society is achieving cohesion. During the recent period of crisis seven new metro stations have opened, Athens has commenced work on a master plan for extensions to both the metro and tram system, the new archaeological museum

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OP-ED

RADICAL ROOTS FOR RADICAL ROUTES by Joseph Watson London Creative Director, National Trust www.nationaltrust.org.uk/london @josephrbwatson IMAGES COURTESY OF SOPHIA SCHORR-KON + ED HAYNES

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“National Trust adopts ‘Britain’s ugliest building’ as star attraction”, the Mirror’s headline railed. Over in The Times, “National Trust opens up a high-rise (but there’s no tea shop)”, was the more measured response to the conservation charity’s temporary opening of Balfron Tower in Poplar, East London, during autumn 2014.

Running counter to the headline, readers of the Mirror voted three to one in favour of the opening in an online poll – and Maureen’s Pie & Mash Shop provided an admirable alternative to the cream tea and chintz so often associated with the Trust. But the strong media reaction elicits questions. Not only, why did the National Trust do this in the first place, but also, six months on, what did we learn from it and what might it mean for the future of the organisation? In grappling with these questions below, my views are – inescapably – my own.

The suggestion that doing heritage within an urban context is different may not provoke much dispute here.

But perhaps that feels especially pronounced for an organisation that has so traditionally been associated with rural landscapes and country houses. For one, the urban audience is different: younger, yes; more diverse, of course; and overwhelmed with choice for their leisure time.

For another, the faster-moving city context means that what people think of as heritage can be much more recent. In a way that would be incomprehensible in, say, the context of a 17th-century country house, landscape parkland, and Domesday village set-piece, the 1960s and ‘70s may quite reasonably be considered heritage in the city, viewed through the rose-tinted spectacles of cutesy revival or not.

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LEFT: SOPHIA SCHORR-KON

RIGHT: ED HAYNES

IMAGES: SOPHIA SCHORR-KON

Balfron, then, was merely the latest in a line of National Trust initiatives that have sought to find new ways of engaging London audiences and test where the boundaries of heritage lie in an urban context. Projects have ranged from handing over the keys to some of our ten London sites to RCA and UCL Slade art schools, to creating Soho Stories, an awardwinning app charting the post-war history of Soho; from the creation of Octavia’s Orchard, a pop-up urban orchard on the South Bank, to the opening of the Big Brother House as, we argued, the ‘home’ most redolent of the first decade of the 21st century – for good or for ill.

So when at short notice the opportunity to open Flat 130 of the Balfron Tower (the very flat Ernö Goldfinger lived in to demonstrate the virtues of high-rise living) as a National Trust visit, we immediately leapt at it. Not only was the building an icon of London and a quintessential example of the highrise type, but the connection with our own 2 Willow Road, the Goldfingers’ family home in Hampstead, gave the project a pre-existing intellectual and emotional connection to the National Trust.

The visit – experienced by some 1,000 visitors over 20 days – saw people first assemble in groups of 12 next to a community café at Langdon Park DLR station. From there, two of our team of 35 volunteer tour guides, who ranged from an insurance broker to a local teacher, a queer studies doctoral student to an architect, led each group on a short tour of Poplar before approaching the Tower, with the attendant and rising “delicate sense of terror”, noted by Goldfinger’s one-time assistant James Dunnett.

Inside, they were whisked up 27 floors by lift – to witness Flat 130 with its Hemingway (re)created décor, pictured here, and take in the breathtaking views of East London. Beyond that wow factor, the experience of a 42

semi-derelict, sublime, ‘decanted’-forfuture-development Brutalist tower block was poignant, even melancholic.

But this was more than a merely visual experience. Throughout the tours, we impressed upon visitors the wider context of the Balfron development. Though relatively little known, Poplar is incredibly important to the history of architecture and of social housing, being the location for the architecture profession’s contribution to the 1951 Festival of Britain. The resulting Lansbury Estate was supplemented in the 1960s by the

neighbouring Brownfield Estate, which includes Balfron Tower, Carradale and Glenkerry House, all by Goldfinger’s office and, later again in the 1970s, the Smithsons’ Robin Hood Gardens. The area probably constitutes the most important architectural timeline of post-war social housing in Europe.

This was not just a story of one building, then, but the history of a place and its people – a history that the National Trust was able to shine a light upon, and provoke a national debate about, even for a short while.

So what did we learn from this experience? What could it mean for the future of the organisation?

To discern a 21st-century role for the National Trust, it is useful (necessary, even) to look to its past for a moment, a past rooted in democratising city spaces. Its

founders, most notably Octavia Hill, fought to save places for people throughout London: not country estates, but urban public spaces; not for the benefit of the petite bourgeoisie, but in her own dated but well-meaning terms “the urban working poor”. Deptford’s Sayes Court (a hot topic once more) was one of a number of failures to protect a place that ultimately led to the creation of the National Trust in 1895.

I wonder, can these radical roots suggest radical routes to becoming an organisation once again relevant for an urban population?

We are already understood to be protectors – of the places that we own. From Morden Hall Park to Sutton House, Osterley to 2 Willow Road we care for and open places of beauty for public enjoyment.

Next up, the Trust clearly has a role

as promoters – of the places we own and care for, and increasingly of the places we don’t, too. Our projects in Soho and Poplar, not to mention a partnership with some 12 independent heritage sites are early examples of this in action. I believe the next stage for the National Trust in London is to become provocateurs – stimulating dialogue about the ‘place’ issues facing Londoners at the moment. What sort of places do we want to live? And work and play?

What needs to change to make that so? From public vs. private space to the provision of well-designed housing, the role developers play in shaping the city to protecting London’s architectural heritage (Save Norton Folgate is just the beginning…), it seems to me that the National Trust can provide a vital voice towards living better urban lives.

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TAXIDERMIFIED LONDON

exploring developments in Notting Hill by Marco Picardi Communities Consultant MA International Studies and Diplomacy MSc International Planning

by Felix Grenfell-Bozek European Policy Analyst MA Histor y of International Relations MSc European Public Policy

www.lookatyourcity.com marco.t.picardi@gmail.com @LookAtYourCity

felixjgb@gmail.com

IMAGES COURTESY OF MARCO PICARDI

Tourists see London – and especially Notting Hill – as ‘vibrant’ and in many ways, London is: cultural diversity, busy markets, nightlife permeating the whole city, pubs with individual characters, buskers on the tube, etc. But, there is a phenomenon that threatens to hollow out what has given the city this life, and replace it with a synthetic version of itself.

London’s recent development patterns, and their impact, have been well observed. People are being evicted from their homes to the city’s periphery and beyond. 1 A creeping privatisation of public space continues to grow. 2 Independent pubs are closing at unprecedented rates, with those that survive often forming part of larger chains, 3 a form of displacement that can be traced to the redevelopment of markets and the regeneration of local high streets. Essentially, economic

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pressures of squeezed local budgets on the one hand and a financialisation of the economy on the other are exacerbating changes that have always been part of London life.

This is discernable in the recently unveiled plans for part of Portobello Market, which sets to transform “a lively vintage market, a small retail arcade, food stalls and temporary performances” into “artisan retail; food and beverage; events and performance spaces; improved markets.” 4 Aside from ambiguously termed “creative industries outlets” and the inevitable addition of “residential units”, recognising the difference between what is proposed and what already exists is not straightforward. But, developers’ hopes of building on the market’s heritage to support their idea of “attracting new business into the area”, is revealing because to facilitate this,

The old green grocers, Hicks, shut for sometime on Golborne Road.

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The Westway Flyover, built through the Notting Hill in 1960s.

“some existing businesses will be relocated.”

Portobello’s heritage is therefore being used to ‘leverage’ its very displacement. What risks being created is a sort of stuffed animal: a veneer of market heritage preserved, while the life that created it is extinguished. The developers see no disjuncture between - in the words of their wider vision statement - “celebrating our culture and heritage” and their commitment to “building a vibrant destination.” 5

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It is, of course, impossible for a city to have such a deep tradition of tourism, with its sometimes servile but always stylised selfpresentation, and not expect visitor-oriented development to disrupt local life. But it is another thing for these mooted changes to explicitly profit from a synthetic version of what has been displaced. And this is exactly what is happening across Notting Hill: as the area changes, its history is becoming marketed as an increasingly exclusive product.

Take the example of Portobello Square, a new development

situated a short stroll from the market behind Golborne Road. The very use of the name Portobello for a project on the 1960s site of the less appealingly named Wornington Green Estate is an explicit attempt to “fit seamlessly within what is already a bustling and lively urban area … an area famous for its eclectic style and diverse community.” 6 This ‘style’ is directly derived from the prominence of independent shops in the area - in 2013 Portobello Road was found to be the high street with the highest percentage of independent shops in Britain. But, with one-beds starting at over half a million pounds, rather than representing the continuity the name suggests, the Square is part of the changing market road, one in which independent shops are being replaced bit-by-bit by chain restaurants and international retailers.

The synthetisation of Notting Hill has been incremental, but it is now increasingly marked.

The redevelopment of Lipka’s Arcade, home to nearly one hundred antique traders into a chain clothes store that covers its shop windows with antique sewing machines is perhaps emblematic of this vogue. The degeneration of social hubs established by Caribbean arrivals to the 1950s Notting Hill of ‘No blacks, No Irish, No dogs’ notoriety is another case in point. Restaurants and clubs such as The Globe and Mangrove, instrumental in black power movements and the formation of the Notting Hill Carnival, have respectively become a bookingsonly restaurant “hopelessly

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at the forefront of a friedchicken boom in London” and a “Caribbean inspired beach shack” chain, a reinterpretation for new markets. The area’s heritage, the manifestation of a particular cultural blend, has been commodified into a marketing device set only to be successful until the new ‘movement’ - one day Nordic brunch, the next ‘brinner’ - lures you to part with your wages faster than the other trends it can nudge out of the way.

The mock-up factories championing London’s industrial past that appeared at an Olympics ceremony on a site bulldozed of all traces of this heritage may have represented this emerging trend. Across London, the city’s twentieth century metropolitan culture, born from a rare mix of diverse people, is being replaced for profit in a repackaged form only affordable by a far narrower, and richer, demographic. This is an urban form of taxidermy where houses become investments instead of homes, neighbourhoods become facades, high streets replicate each other, and cultures become commodified fetishes, and it risks leading to an atrophy of what made the city great.

In 1970, Portobello’s local underground paper Frendz, reported that “the battle in Notting Hill Gate is not just a battle in a small and highly populated area of London, it is representative in a definitive sense of the battle of a whole new society.” In a sense this sentiment can be reapplied to today’s context where urban taxidermy not only is creating something synthetic, but risks

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sharpening local inequalities and other sources of discord. Is this the city we want, a stuffed animal?

References: 1

Duggan, E., 2014, ‘Great council house sell-off scandal: Right-tobuy council houses leave nowhere for poor to live’, The Independent.

Friday 31 October. Available online.

2

Vasagar, J. 2012, ‘Public spaces in Britain’s cities fall into private hands’, The Guardian. Monday 11 June. Available online.

3

The Economist, 2013, ‘Bar Room Brawl’, The Economist. 20 July.

Available online.

4

Westway Development Trust, 2015.

Portobello Village Proposal. Westway Development Trust. Available online.

5

Westway Development Trust, 2014. Destination Westway. Westway Development Trust. Available online.

A photo reminder of the ‘old’ Notting Hill. The People’s Hall formed the centre of Frestonia, a self-declared micro state in Notting Hill.

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REPLACING HERITAGE WITH HERITAGE IN SHARJAH’S BANK STREET by Rene Boer Failed Architecture www.failedarchitecture.com rene@failedarchitecture.com @FailedArch IMAGES COURTESY OF MICHIEL VAN IERSEL, HIND MEZAINA, RENE BOER

Nowadays the sprawling capital of an emirate, Sharjah was only a small fishing village less than half a century ago. Like Dubai, its bigger brother a few miles down the coast, the city went through a process of unprecedented growth and development. Over the last decade, Sharjah and Dubai have practically grown into one major metropolitan area, although both cities have retained their own atmosphere. Where Dubai is the world’s glitzy hub of consumption, Sharjah is is characterised by a predominantly low-rise and more residential urban environment.

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Bank Street was one of the first major developments in Sharjah and consists of 18 office blocks that partly replaced the original urban fabric of the fishing village.

Each side of the street features a particular type of modernistinspired architecture resulting in two different, striking rows of buildings. As the 18 buildings are almost identical in shape and présence, they create a harmonious and intimate urban space rarely seen in cities in the Gulf.

At construction the most modern and luxurious part of town, the street has been in steady decline over time. Most of the buildings have not been maintained very well, are now inhabited by migrant families, and newspapers have been reporting rising crime rates in the area. At the same time, the authorities have been planning for a major transformation of central Sharjah, which will include the demolition of probably all the 18 iconic buildings.

In order to brand themselves more specifically, Sharjah wants to rebuild the ‘historical’ village and turn it into a major destination for tourists. The area will include several museums, shopping opportunities and five star boutique hotels, all in a re-constructed ‘traditional’, ‘oriental’ setting. It has even been listed for world heritage status and will soon replace the early development era’s heritage in Bank Street.

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MAKING HERITAGE by Rachel O’Grady BArch MA (Cantab) Dip.Arch PhD candidate: Depar tment of Rapid Change and Scarce Resources, CASS www.facebook.com/bukshsangrahalaya rachelogrady@googlemail.com IMAGES COURTESY OF RACHEL O’GRADY

The chances for people to engage with the physical alteration of the city seem to be decreasing.

Often the only option available to us in order to protect a site we love from redevelopment is to campaign to English Heritage, or the equivalent authority abroad for a formal listing. However, once a site is listed, the ways in which we can adapt, maintain and curate it are severely constrained.

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IMAGE:

I have spent the last two years researching various interpretations of what constitutes ‘heritage’ in a cluster of slum-settlements called Tajganj next to the Taj Mahal in Agra, North India: an area teeming with listed architectural ‘heritage’, but also rapidly developing. There, historic sites are protected by the Archaeological Survey of India, (ASI), and it did not take long to realise that for every ‘registered

Before and after: reinvention of a ruined house in Tajganj

monument’ (listed building), in the area, there were hundreds of other sites considered equally important by local residents for a variety of reasons. Therefore rather than deciding to focus on what should be considered valuable, or how sites should be selected and treated, I studied the process of locally negotiating these issues. In other words, I was interested in the value of the act of remembering and

retelling stories much more than the stories themselves. This was because I had witnessed that when people get together to negotiate what to keep in the city, that moment becomes a point where deep values are fought for and come to light. Protecting ‘heritage’ is a form of ethical engagement: a moment when people renegotiate the hierarchy of parts of the city that are most important to them.

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IMAGE: Bilochpura

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Tajganj is a counter example to widespread acceptance of what a city can be. Up to 2006, which brought outsider intervention under a national slum-upgrading programme, the area had been neglected by the rest of the city for over 300 years, which meant that every square meter was internally negotiated and cared for. For this reason, a whole range of values, from religious beliefs to important social occasions had shaped this historical district over time. Uncovering the process of how these values were negotiated during acts of city making - how people managed to maintain a rich and relevant urban environment without trying to suspend aesthetic change was my research aim.

At the time of research, a new ‘heritage trail’ was being planned in Tajganj. I took this opportunity to set up small architectural projects that gave residents the opportunity to restore and curate sites of their choosing to reveal alternative sets of ‘heritage’ values to those of the ASI or ministry of tourism.

The image on the left is of a neighbourhood in Tajganj called Bilochpura records an exercise called ‘plaques’, where residents pinned up handwritten memories and stories on the walls of significant sites in an informal exhibition. This shows that most of the neighbourhood was an archive of memories, however only the Shahi Mosque, (shown in blue), is a registered monument.

Shockingly, due to Indian planning law, what this means is that in order to protect the mosque everything else in this image is under threat, as it is near impossible for residents to get planning permission for building repair this close to a registered monument.

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IMAGES: The Buksh family home before work started, and various designs for repair

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One of my architectural research projects was the ongoing reinterpretation and restoration of a ruined family home in Bilochpura. It was slowly transformed by residents into a temporary ‘museum’, or fair celebrating the work of local artisans and hobby-crafters.

During the process, various groups of craftspeople, masons, builders and youth clubs worked with the owner to imagine the future repair of the building. Each design drew upon historically refined techniques, such as stone carving, as well as those more recently available such as casting concrete in order to design something that reflected their aspirations. These designs may have been very different from the ‘sensitive’ restoration recommended by the ASI. However, they somehow moved

much more fluidly between tradition, relevance and ambition whilst granting continuity to the things they valued most, from daily dining rituals to acts of worship.

I asked each group to create objects from their restoration designs which could be assembled in the Buksh house in a way that made the ruin an acceptable site for an event. During these exercises, ways in which the house jarred with or suited the participants’ values became clear.

For example, a large group of young Muslim women were able to become core collaborators due to the way the house had many semi-private spaces, and a ‘back entrance’ so that they did not have to go into the bazaar street before entering. This spatial appropriateness was no

coincidence - the building had been shaped over a hundred years to suit its cultural context.

Until planning permission was granted, even basic repairs could not be made. Participants felt that the cracks and ruins should be covered with a temporary earth floor, paint, and silk ‘bandages’ that wrapped the walls: while ruins might hold a romanticism to a European like myself, to residents, they were an embarrassment, and a potential opportunity for outsiders to look patronisingly upon the crumbling living conditions of slum inhabitants. This touched on a core sensitivity in the rapidly developing neighbourhood.

Traditionally, in Bilochpura people lay carpets and sit on the floor at an event, but we had no suitable 59

IMAGE: The Buksh family home - FIRST FLOOR PLAN

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IMAGE: Floating carpet structures

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IMAGE: Bush Museum Events: First Floor Plan

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floor. A ‘false floor’ was made by binding traditional woven beds, ‘charpoys’, into a bamboo shade structure, which was then lined with carpet. A fabric tent was put up in place of the collapsed roof, in itself a form of heritage ‘revival’, because a tradition of using tented structures for important events can be traced back 400 years in Agra to the Mughal Empire.

A semi-enclosed space was created by the participants by screening the verandah with silk curtains so that just as the house provided a range of intimate spaces, so too would the event taking place on the terrace.

The image to the left is a comparison between a practicerun of the museum event, before the architectural changes were made, and the final event. In the final event a greater range of residents, especially women and children felt comfortable and welcome as they had been involved in shaping the material environment in accordance with their values. This was a small insight into the way that the neighbourhood had evolved for hundreds of years to suit its residents. Sometimes, these values were arguably negative such as the spatial segregation of men and women. However, these are exactly the kind of issues that can be made visible and negotiated in the collaborative reinvention of place.

These collaborative city-making practices could be considered ‘heritage’ in themselves, as well as being a form of ‘heritage preservation’, giving continuity to the things people value most.

The sad irony in Tajganj that they are damaged and threatened by heritage protection law highlights the fact that the process of negotiating values through the architecture of the city is too often missed out of the heritage conversation.

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P H OTO E S S AY

STOMPING GROUND by Colin Priest Course Leader for BA(hons) Interior and Spatial Design at Chelsea College of Ar ts, University of the Ar ts, London. www.studiocolumba.com IMAGES COURTESY OF COLIN PRIEST

This starts with a good, long, curving two-storey range with shops, leading from the crossroads to the pedestrian area, but then come a distracting number of fussy angles and garish colours. The car park has white and yellow ceramic cladding (wearing badly). The Centre ends in NEW ZEALAND AVENUE with a range with sky-blue panels, on tapering stilts.

(The Buildings of England, Surrey; Ian Nairn and Nikolaus Pevsner; Penguin Books 1971; 2nd ed. p.497)

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THE CENTRE, Walton-on-Thames by R. Seifert & Partners July 1965 - April 2004

IMAGE:

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INCIDENTAL HERITAGE by Matthew Cook BA(hons) Architecture Community Engagement Specialist matthew@fargreen.co.uk IMAGES COURTESY OF MATTHEW COOK

Before motorways, air freight and the thunder of articulated lorries along our roads, the nation relied on a quieter and more sedate method to move crucial supplies around the country. The canals moved goods, materials and fuel from ports and docks, helping power the industrial revolution and feed the nation. These thoroughfares would cut through the countryside and snake along behind high streets and terraced houses, bringing their goods to the centre of our towns and cities.

In a symbiotic relationship with Britain’s industry, their routes led them to the existing mills, yards and brick fields. Soon after, new industry grew around the canals, keen to take advantage of the connections the waterways offered to the rest of the world.

As our cities grew up around the canals we bridged our roads across them and ran our houses along them; the mark of the canal imprinted in the buildings and the streets.

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their eventual decline had already started to spread. The railways offered a speed of delivery the canals could never match. The later growth of automobiles, trunk roads and, in the white heat of the United Kingdom’s post-war technological development, the motorways, meant that the time of canals was over.

Some of the canals fell into dereliction, many dried out or were filled in by authorities who either needed the land or were concerned about the danger presented to venturing children by these deep, cold bodies of water. However, even though the canal had been removed and no barges or narrowboats could traverse the land, the decisions and workarounds they left can still be seen today. They can be subtle, passing many busy commuters by, or practically invisible to anyone not armed with the knowledge or the maps of the canal’s route.

Bridges once carrying the cars over the water now lift vehicles across linear parks and cycle routes. Timber yards, selling

construction materials to their local homebuilders now get their deliveries from a lorry, not from the canal that terminated behind their business when they were established. Buildings, gardens and pubs carry names with words such as wharf, barge, or towpath, though they are now miles from the nearest navigable waters.

Even buildings built after the disappearance of the canal still reference this history. Sometimes deliberate, a postmodern building detail suggesting the prow of a ship or the ripple of water.

Sometimes through necessity, the housing estate built around the canal, by engineers too nervous to build towers on the unknown materials used to fill the long hole.

Through these photos I have explored the incidental heritage left by the canals. I have tracked their paths and discovered their calling cards. I have crossed over them and walked along them.

These canals may have gone, but their ghosts will remain to be seen by those who notice them for years to come.

Space originally left for the now filled canal creates an alignment that even distant new developments avoid overstepping

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IMAGE:

Towpaths once walked by boat horses and their drivers, hauling barges behind them, now pavement elevating those on feet above the traffic

Buildings, erected over the site of the canal and the warehouses along its banks still show the site of the left turn northwards

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The backs of houses, build along the route of the canal that visited the kilns of the brick fields that stood here before.

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Industry that grew along the canals remains, although the increasing pressure for development land and regeneration opportunity is ever present

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The alignment of a roof ’s apex, a carpark’s end or a wall’s direction are clues that without corroboration or prior knowledge a pedestrian is likely to pass unawares

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Obsolete infrastructure sits landlocked, no longer passed below by vessels crossing the country

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METROPOLE by Lewis Bush Photographer www.lewisbush.com lewis@lewisbush.com @lewiskaybush IMAGES COURTESY OF LEWIS BUSH

‘Metropole’ was once a term used to describe London in its relationship with the British Empire, a relationship hierarchical and unequal, with power radiating out from the metropolitan centre, and the resources of the dominions radiating back in return. The decline of the national empires of the eighteenth and nineteenth century has given rise to a new global power, that of capital, which has similarly centred itself on London, the axis mundi of empire. Metropole records the effect of this capital influx on London, the rapid transformation of swathes of the metropolis, and the sensation of feeling lost in a city one once regarded as home.

Metropole is a composite of dozens of walks taken through London at night, recording the city’s high rises and new construction sites. As Metropole progresses the initially dream-like photographs become increasingly confusing and nightmarish. Using in-camera double exposures to layer buildings over themselves, Metropole warps the familiar city into a series of complex overlapping patterns reminiscent of the abstractions of Vorticist paintings. Finally the view come to the rest on the financial centre of the city, the dark heart driving the change in the city.

Micro-exhibition, 10th March to 10th April 2015, at the London Arts Board, corner of Peckham Road and Vestry Road, London, SE5

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Elms

Elephant I

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Elephant II

Cannon

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Belvedere

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Holland

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Aspen

Warren

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Fenchurch

Canary

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