URBAN ISM • Developing density: surgical repair to the heart of Cambridge
Two new retail buildings opposite one another have profoundly altered the centre of Cambridge. lvor Richards weighs up the merits of Chapman Toy/or's Grand Arcade and Panter Hudspith's mixed-use Christ's Lane, while Colen Lumley investigates their role in the 50 year renewal of the city's historic core. 40 • AT191
The commercial development of the Camb1idge University and its major colleges have been steadily building new architecture medieval market town has consistently folsince the rnid-1950s. Little of this vast expan- lowed a more distinctly densified pattern, sion is particularly evident to tl1e ordinary cit- whether by policy, commercial pressure or izen within ilie town, with a few notable both, beginning with Bradwell's Court and exce ptions such as Bridge Street, ilie later the Lion Yard in tl1e 1950s and 70s. Two Quayside and the excellent buildings for recent projects exemplifY the continuity of both Magdalene and St John 's by David this densification as well as tl1e increasing Roberts and Powell & Moya from the 1960s. sophistication of commercial and mixed-use The more dispersed faculties of the Arts architecture in Cambridge - the developand Humanities at Sidgwick Avenue and ment known as Grand Arcade designed by West Road, together with the new colleges of Chapman Taylor, incorporating ilie n ew Robinson and Clare Hall nearby, signal the J ohn Lewis store with concept design by western shift. Th is policy is now particularly Colin Stansfield-Smith and John Pardey marked with the remote western expansion Architects, and Panter Hudspith 's mixed-use of Research & Development. project across St Andrew's Street which