Urban Realm magazine issue 46, summer

VOL11 ISSUE46 SUMMER 2021

NE W R EAL I T Y: PANDORA’S BOX

SCOTTISH DESIGN AWARDS ARCHIZINES WHAT IF...?

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M

I F TO AN ES

A dawning realisation that temporary stop-gaps designed to facilitate some form of normality are already gaining an air of permanence prompts Urban Realm to look in more detail at the forces unleashed.

Landscape architects are leading the charge to refashion the world in their image (pg 12) through a series of urban greening initiatives that will bring nature closer to our everyday lives.

Moving one step further than reshaping the land are Sir David Adjaye (pg 58) and Phineas Harper (pg 40), advocates of harnessing the ground beneath our feet not as something to walk upon but a sustainable construction resource.

At the forefront of the sustainability drive is urbanist Daisy Narayanan (pg 27), now in charge of transport and placemaking at City of Edinburgh, with a remit to make active travel the default mode of

transport not just today but in the years to come.

Adopting a bottom-up approach for the Biennale Architecturra (pg 32) are 7N Architects with What If..? fruit of a realisation that the greatest impediment to progress isn’t always financial but can be a lack of imagination.

Luckily there is no shortage of inspiration on hand with this year’s crop of Scottish Design Awards nominees (pg 72) as we pull together some of the projects to watch ahead of the big summer reveal.

We also catch up with Allan Murray fresh from the unveil of the St James Quarter with the news that the architect is now at the helm of a new design-led practice with a remit to bring joy back into people’s lives at a time when we could all do with a pick-me-up.

John Glenday, editor

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CONT ENTS QUARTERLY DIGEST 12 LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE 27 DAISY NARAYANAN 32 WHAT IF..?

40 ARCHITECTURE FRINGE 46 ALLAN MURRAY DESIGN 53 TEAM ESTEEM 58 SIR DAVID ADJAYE 64 ARCHIZINES 72 SCOTTISH DESIGN AWARDS 86 TAMSIE THOMSON 90 CANDLERIGGS QUARTER 96 DIRECTORY 97 PRODUCTS 04

Cover image: St Matthew’s Parish Church by Page/Park. Photography by Ross Campbell

OUR EDITORIAL PANEL INCLUDES:

John Glenday

Mark Chalmers, architecture writer and photographer

Leslie Howson, director Urban Design

Thea McMillan, director, Chambers McMillan

Jonathan Reeve, architect, Voigt Partnership

Gioia Sawaya, Architect

Alistair Scott, director, Smith Scott Mullan

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Q U A R T E R L Y D I G E S T A P R

CLYNELISH DISTILLERY Diageo has opened the doors to its latest distillery visitor centre following a multimillion-pound redevelopment.

Clynelish Distillery near Brora was remodelled by Michael Laird Architects last year but has had to remain shut

through the lockdown. Now with a phased reopening of the economy underway and a resumption in domestic travel boosting the popularity of local attractions, Diageo has officially opened the attraction.

LEARNING HUB

EMPLOYEE OWNERSHIP

The University of Glasgow has opened the doors to the James McCune Smith Learning Hub, a £90m teaching and learning facility designed by HLM. Home to over 2,500 students the hub includes individual study spaces for students unable to study from home and is named after the prominent civil rights activist and first African American to receive a medical degree, awarded by the University of Glasgow in 1837.

CSY Architects have formed an employee ownership trust to manage the business for the collective benefit of all 24 staff.

Employees across Edinburgh, Dalkeith, Berwick and Galashiels now have a controlling stake in the business, formed from a recent merger between Camerons Architects, Douglas Strachan Architects and Bain Swan Architects.

WESTERN GENERAL HLM has commenced work on a new cancer facility for NHS Lothian at the Western General Hospital in Edinburgh.

The linear accelerator (LINAC) will combine radiation-shielded bunkers, a cancer assessment unit and oncology administration offices with a direct physical link to the existing Radiotherapy Department.

Features such as ceiling grids designed to mimic a bright sky and overhead trees will provide a calming interior.

URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

BRIEFS Lowther Homes, with funding from Glasgow City Council, has purchased the notorious Bellgrove Hotel in Glasgow’s east end in a first step towards developing the site as part of the Gallowgate Transformational Regeneration Area.

Plans to deliver homes for midmarket rent at the B-listed 1930s building will now be developed to complement the ongoing regeneration of the area.

Clyde Gateway has begun work on a complementary lookout tower and bothy at Cuningar Loop Woodland Park as part of a £2.3m package of work to improve facilities.

‘The Tur’ will provide park-goers with elevated views over 37 acres of parkland and the River Clyde while a nearby bothy will introduce a multi-functional space for community and business use.

Designed by jmarchitects and built by Linear Design & Construct the timber duo will utilise off-site manufacturing to complete by the end of the year.

IQ Student Accommodation and Cooper Cromar have authored plans to replace 1970’s office accommodation at 225 Bath Street, Glasgow, with 560 bedrooms stacked above continuous amenity space housed within a ground floor plinth.

Finished in a ‘restrained’ selection of two different types of brick with complementary bronze metalwork, including doubleheight framed ‘portals’ defining points of access.

Simon Winstanley, the founder of Simon Winstanley Architects, has passed away at the age of 73 following a short illness, bequeathing a legacy of striking low-energy homes across Dumfries and Galloway.

Winstanley co-founded his eponymous Castle Douglas based practice in 1983 (then known as Crallan & Winstanley Architects) until his retirement in 2018.

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Q U A R T E R L Y A P R D I G E S T MOTHERWELL OLD TOWN HALL

DEJA VU

Motherwell’s C-listed Old Town Hall is to play host to 20 apartments for social rent under plans filed by North Lanarkshire Council and Mast Architects.

Owned by North Lanarkshire Properties, an arms-length subsidiary of the council, the building is currently split between a partially occupied business centre and an abandoned laser tag play area and cafe.

Glasgow City Council has awarded John McAslan & Partners the design contract for the remodelling of George Square and its environs.

The £2.3m City Deal funded contract will see the practice lead the delivery of new infrastructure and public realm to develop the central civic space as a hub for the broader Avenues programme, following another design competition.

CLARKSTON CHURCH Greenbank Parish Church in Clarkston has filed plans to erect a hall extension and a replacement house to enable the construction of a new residential nursing home.

A joint application sees Page/Park with RankinFraser oversee the new church facilities, while Holmes Miller and TGP deliver the nursing home on behalf of Morrison Community Care.

STREET HEALER Plans for a major office-led development in Dundee have emerged at the hands of Haus Collective, who are to deliver a 75,000sq/ft office block alongside 16 apartments.

Delivered as two separate buildings

rising above a continuous parade of ground floor commercial units Greenmarket Dundee is led by Ayr-based Crucible Alba Group and will rise on a 0.9ha car park in Seabraes, close to the city’s main train station.

BRIEFS BAM Construction and LA Architects are to begin delivery of a £35.5m leisure centre in Ayr later this year following the appointment of Hub South-West

by South Ayrshire Council to lead the project.

Supplanting the existing Citadel Leisure Centre at Ayr Harbour the new facility will rise on the site of the vacant Arran Mall Hourstons department store in the town centre, with elements of the 1896 building to be incorporated into emerging designs.

Keppie Design has come forward with plans to deliver a major mixed-use development at Yorkhill Quay on behalf of Peel L&P owned Glasgow Harbour.

The latest phase of the riverfront masterplan, first initiated in 2008, centres on a development site at Yorkhill Quay earmarked for 500 flats for private rent, 400 coliving homes and a further 200 flats for sale. This accommodation would be complemented by 2,950sq/m of leisure floor space and a 200-bed hotel all fronting a continuous river walkway.

CALA Homes have opened a ‘show village’ at their Prince’s Quay development on the former Glasgow Garden Festival site at Pacific Quay.

Designed by Haus Architects the development complements the creation of a nearby media campus on reclaimed docks.

Final designs for a unique hydroelectric power project on the banks of the River Ness at Whin Park have been revealed

by Leslie Hutt Architect and HydroNI. The Archimedes Screw design has been under development for several years and will translate the rotation of twin water-powered screws to generate an estimated 100kW of electricity.

Expected to become a tourism attraction for the region an onsite visitor centre is also planned.

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Q U A R T E R L Y D I G E S T M A Y

TYNECASTLE HIGH

The former Tynecastle High School is to be transformed into student housing

by S1 Developments and Michael Laird Architects.

The B-listed school has lain derelict for over a decade but will now be restored by its new owners, retaining the existing McLeod Street building in the shadow of

Tynecastle Stadium while delivering carfree new build accommodation within the grounds.

Constrained by proximity to the North British Distillery and the Western Approach the site is considered unsuitable for mainstream residential due to noise, smell and air quality issues.

FOUNTAINBRIDGE Vastint Hospitality has completed a 60,000sq/ft of grade A office space at New Fountainbridge, Edinburgh.

No2 Freer Street forms part of the first phase of the canalside development which also includes a 262-bed Moxy Hotel, retail and public realm.

Designed by 3Dreid Architects alongside main contractor McLaughlin & Harvey and project managers HD Property Consultants the build achieves an EPC ‘A’ and BREEAM ‘Very Good’ ratings.

G3 SQUARE Drum Property Group has released the final apartments at Minerva Street, Finnieston, ahead of full completion later this summer.

G3 Square has been designed by DarntonB3 Architecture to provide 108 homes close to Exhibition Centre Station.

Apartments are designed with spacious open plan kitchen and living areas as well as dedicated areas for working from home.

A further 31 homes have been approved for the third phase of work.

URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

BRIEFS North Ayrshire Council has awarded a £4.2m construction contract to build a new visitor and community hub in the Garnock Valley to CCG. Designed by Collective Architecture the Garnock Hub will be delivered via Hub South West as part of a design team that includes include TCS Construction Consultants, David Narro Associates, Clancy Consultants and Hirst Landscape Architects.

Completion is expected by autumn 2022.

Glasgow City Council has put its weight behind efforts to double the 2020 resident city centre population of around 20,000 (3.5% of the city as a whole) by 2050.

This feat will be accomplished by repopulating central districts and re-establishing broken connections to the inner city and the river.

Hub West Scotland and Holmes Miller have opened the doors to a new early years centre in Milngavie, one of three such facilities planned for East Dunbartonshire as part of an expansion of childcare services.

Oakburn Early Years Centre has a capacity for 101 2-5-year-olds and offers a range of playrooms wrapped around an internal courtyard that extends beyond the boundaries of the building as well as a mezzanine level with access to a chute to the lower level.

BDP has completed a full refurbishment of the B-listed former Ayr Grammar as part of work to deliver a new primary and community hub.

Ayr Grammar Primary School has been delivered on behalf of South Ayrshire Council, doubling as a civic hub next to the 17th century Ayr Citadel through the provision of a community arts centre and archives housing historical records and fine art.

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Q U A R T E R L Y M A Y D I G E S T RAIL RENAISSANCE

CLACHAN HOMES

BRIEFS

7N Architects have won an architectural competition led by Network Rail to reimagine Britain’s rail network.

Run in conjunction with the Royal Institute of British Architects the competition saw 7N see off competition from around the country with a station design that caters for both commuters and communities. Harking back to the civic grandeur of the railways heyday the chosen design is dominated by a clock tower defining a combined social space and entrance.

Olli Blair Architects have put forward plans for 16 family homes at Struan Road, Portree, on land to the northwest of the Bracken Hide Hotel.

Situated on the outskirts of the Skye capital the development will occupy the site of the former Portree Golf Course, which has lain disused since the 1950s.

Modelled on a Highland clachan the design arranges properties around a communal landscaped area with homes following the site topology and employing five different variants.

North Lanarkshire Council is progressing a significant package of road infrastructure improvements at Ravenscraig funded by the Glasgow City Deal.

Working with Amey Consulting the authority will drive a new dual carriageway with associated walking and cycling links into the brownfield development to improve access to nearby Motherwell as part of the £190m Pan-Lanarkshire Orbital Transport Corridor connecting the M74 to the M80.

GOING SOLO

Perth & Kinross Council has awarded planning consent for a Passivhaus primary school at North Muirton, Perth, which will slash energy use by as much as 80%.

Billed as the first such primary school to be delivered in Scotand the 500-pupil campus has been designed by sustainability specialists Architype as a replacement for North Muirton and Balhousie Primary Schools.

Delivered by Robertson Construction on behalf of Hub East central the school will be built within the grounds of the existing North Muirton Primary and will include a nursery and additional support needs accommodation when it opens early in 2023.

Aberdeen City Council is considering a purchase of the former Aberdeen Market and BHS building to kickstart the regeneration of the city centre, either directly or with a development partner.

A committee report recommends that both sites be taken into public ownership to progress a mix of retail, food, drink and leisure uses at Hadden Street as well as improved access from Union Street.

WILDFLOWER MEADOW

Portobello Sands and Cameron Laird Architects have come forward with revised plans for an infill residential development at Pipe Lane, Edinburgh.

The last remaining brownfield site near listed pottery brick kilns the site will bookend incomplete previous development with 10 apartments arranged over five floors.

Glasgow’s Queen Street Station is set for further expansion following completion of platform extension works, with the submission of plans for ancillary operational and customer facilities below a new podium deck and temporary wildflower meadow suitable for future over

site development.

Enhanced facilities are part of a package of works proposed by Transport Scotland, Atkins and heritage consultants Simpson & Brown to accommodate anticipated growth in passenger numbers through to 2049.

East Renfrewshire Council is inviting feedback on plans for a new Eastwood leisure centre and theatre in advance of a full planning application in the next few months by Stallan-Brand.

The local authority intends to demolish an end of life leisure centre at Eastwood Park, Giffnock.

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Q U A R T E R L Y D I G E S T J U N

WELLNESS DESTINATION An abandoned East Ayrshire colliery has been chosen for an ambitious health and leisure attraction billed as an ecologically sustainable health and wellness destination.

Led by social enterprise company National Pride with Scott Brownrigg Architects the Barony Eco-Therapy

Wellness Centre will straddle the 108-acre Barony Colliery site, delivering a range of recreational amenities including a spa, exercise suite and craft workshops. A range of renewable technologies will also be pioneered such as geothermal energy harnessed from disused mine shafts to power local homes and a nearby hospital.

BRIEFS Kettle Collective will return to the Russian city of St Petersburg to top their work on the Lakhta Centre with the world’s second tallest tower.

Rising to an impressive 703m the Lakhta Centre II will dwarf the practices previous work, topped only by the 828m Burj Khalifa in Dubai, securing a spot in the record books with the highest occupied floor and viewing gallery (at 590m) of any building.

A public consultation is being held by Mosaic Architecture + Design to erect a major new office development within Glasgow’s Broomielaw financial district.

Carrick Square phase 2 is earmarked for 0.75 acres of brownfield land bounded by Brown, Crimea and Carrick Street’s to the immediate north of the phase one build which has already gained planning consent.

BROOMIELAW HOTEL

SHAWLANDS ARCADE

Mosaic Architecture + Design with HMH One Clyde have prepared final plans for an £18m hotel on the Broomielaw.

Straddling the B listed Oswald Chambers and 9 Oswald Street before turning the corner to an adjacent gap-site at 66-74 Broomielaw the build will repair an important junction at the heart of the burgeoning River Clyde corridor.

New plans have been brought forward to reimagine the 1960s Shawlands Arcade as an urban thoroughfare more in keeping with the bustling Kilmarnock Road.

Led by the Arcade owners Clydebuilt with Haus Collective the latest plans would see the current site redeveloped to establish a shopping and residential development.

BILLIONAIRE BROTHERS Billionaire businessmen the Reuben brothers have teamed up with StallanBrand Architects to prepare indicative plans for a mixed-use development on a huge 5.4-acre gap site at St Enoch, Glasgow.

A submission for planning in principle for the King Street Car Park outlines the potential for delivering a mix of apartments, shops, offices and leisure.

URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

Aberdeenshire Council has lodged plans for a new Ellon base combining offices and community facilities as part of a broader rationalisation of its estate.

Located on the annexe of the former Ellon Academy, since relocated to a £36m campus at Cromleybank, the civic hub will provide space for 163 staff in addition to a Family Recourse Centre with its separate entrance and a public library.

Jackson Distillers with Michael Laird Architects are to build a distillery and associated storage warehouse at the Charlesfield Industrial Estate at St Boswells in the Scottish Borders.

The Jackson Distillery will be finished in gold and grey metal rain screen and sheet metal and will process grains sourced from the nearby Tweed Valley.

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Q U A R T E R L Y J U N D I G E S T ST VINCENT CRESCENT

WEST AVENUE

BRIEFS

Page\Park Architects and Nixon Blue have reworked £8m plans for a new residential development at St Vincent Crescent, Glasgow, from the ground up, slashing the number of apartments on offer from 36 to 20 as part of a general reduction in massing.

Now the intention is to meet these concerns by pulling the development back from the street to create a larger public garden and amenity space designed by HarrisonStevens. The buildings will utilise a complementary sandstone finish with all parking hidden out of sight in a basement.

Ambassador Living and Ark Architecture have submitted plans for 155 apartments on a prominent brownfield site bounded

by Finnieston and Minerva Street ahead of a site start early next year.

Drawing inspiration from its New York namesake West Avenue will comprise a range of one to three-bedroom flats stacked above seven ground-floor retail and leisure units behind a frontage of natural stone.

As part of the plan, the public realm on Minerva Street will be enhanced.

Kier Construction has broken ground on a new primary school at Ness Castle in Inverness to cater for an influx of families.

Designed by Stallan-Brand the school will offer 12 classrooms to cater for a growing population when it opens its doors next August, with the option to double capacity at a future date should the need arise.

DUNDEE EDEN Dundee City Council has showcased the first tantalising visualisation of how a possible Eden Project could transform a former gasworks into a biodiverse attraction.

The image illustrates how industrial land at East Dock Street could be transformed from a place to avoid into a major visitor attraction by utilising tall brick walls as a shelter for impressive walled gardens, all within a mile of V&A Dundee.

ACTIVE TRAVEL Renfrewshire Council has completed a new pedestrian and cycle bridge near Glasgow Airport, facilitating active travel between Inchinnan, Renfrew and Paisley.

Spearheaded by Sustrans the Black

Cart crossing takes the form of a 160-tonne steel structure with a 100m span and forms part of efforts to improve infrastructure around a new manufacturing innovation district.

John Gilbert Architects are leading plans to build a collection of 15 affordable ecohomes within the Cairngorms village of Braemar on behalf of a community-run charitable company. A sensitive site surrounded by designated ancient woodland has been selected for the build with its designers stressing they will do their utmost to prevent unnecessary damage to the environment while also continuing to permit access for walkers.

In the process, Norway spruce will be felled with remaining native trees utilised as community-managed woodland.

Page\Park Architects have completed a £1.25m refurbishment of a C-listed Bishopbriggs church, originally designed by Gillespie Kidd & Coia.

Working with St Matthew’s Parish Church for over 5 years the practice has worked to open up space and make it more accessible while working with craftsmen to design bespoke furniture and altarpiece.

Originally built during the immediate aftermath of World War 2 in 1947-8, the modest church made use of salvaged roof timbers, resulting in an unusually narrow plan which contributed to longstanding operational problems.

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LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE

WE HAVE ALL HAD OUR EYES OPENED TO THE IMPORTANCE OF GREENERY, LIGHT AND AIR FOR WELLBEING SO WHAT IS BEING DONE TO REINFORCE A LANDSCAPE-LED RECOVERY? WE SPEAK TO SIX LEADING PRACTICES TO SEE HOW THE PROFESSION IS WORKING WITH COMMUNITIES TO CREATE HUMAN-CENTRIC SPACES WHICH ALSO BUILD BIODIVERSITY, ENCOURAGE USE AND MAKE ALL OUR LIVES THAT BIT MORE PLEASANT. HLM’s work at The Concourse for the University of Sheffield illustrates how green spaces can double as carbon sinks with the right mix of planting URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

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Alethea Ottewell Landscape Architecture Lead HLM Architects How have perceptions and the utility of green spaces shifted over the past year?

Recent lockdowns have amplified the importance of access to greenspace within our neighbourhoods. Our local parks and streets have become busier and more appreciated by the wider community; a place to escape from juggling home, schooling and working life under one roof.

People’s expectations are higher, and they are being used for a wider range of activities, including attending ‘Pop up’ fitness classes and gyms, meeting friends while remaining social distanced, and encouraging children to explore the natural environment through play. Green spaces are places for social engagement, a breath of fresh air to relax, unwind and reset.

What can the profession contribute to the climate conversation as we approach COP-26?

The recovery and loss of our green spaces is a local, national and global issue that needs to be tackled at all levels.

Landscape Architects should approach every project with a base line of sustainable targets, looking to improve on the UK targets such as net zero carbon by 2050, Biodiversity net gain and Urban Greening Factor targets. Simply strategies, Right Tree Right Place, using green spaces as carbon sinks with increased diverse planting communities and address maintenance.

Regenerate neighbourhoods with local focuses, networks that promote active travel, exercise, play, are adequate to enable social distancing and encourage renewal of existing places.

Are we witnessing a shift from global trends & fashions to greater localism?

Yes. The pandemic has altered people’s attitude towards the importance of improving and enjoying our local spaces, and supporting local businesses. With restricted travel, local shops, restaurants, and green spaces have become more important to people throughout the community. Greater localism, specialism and community focus have become paramount to regenerating towns and local centres; the COVID-19 lockdown has highlighted the need for better, more accessible facilities and green spaces, cleaner air and water, and prospects for wildlife, all at a local level. Effective greenspace design has the power to attract people back into towns and cities. >

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LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE

Ngaire Burston Jenny Jones Rose Barton rankinfraser landscape architecture How have perceptions and the utility of green spaces shifted over the past year? (Ngaire Burston) Over the past year we have seen a surge in the use of green spaces. There is an evolving understanding of the importance of green space in our neighbourhoods. The correlation between green space and our health and wellbeing is more pertinent now than it has ever been before. As a practice we always aim to create robust, practical and beautiful spaces that cater to the needs of the people around them. Seeing green spaces we have created such as those at the Scottish National Gallery in East Princes Street Gardens coming to life has been one of the more enjoyable parts of the past year.

How is landscape architecture responding to the demands of active travel, wellbeing & social distancing?

(Jenny Jones) During the pandemic our cities began to be reclaimed for pedestrians and cyclists, rather than for vehicles. We saw

widening of footpaths and cycleways into carriageways, and pop-up outdoor seating for cafes and pubs. As a landscape architect I am excited by this shift, and hope these measures are not temporary, lasting only the extent of social-distancing measures.

Our designs should offer flexible-use, space for exercise and active travel networks. A rankinfraser project completed in Stockbridge provides a new car free high-street space, offering generous pedestrian space for social gathering.

These measures help create vibrant high-streets, aid wellbeing and lower carbon footprints through active travel.

How is landscape architecture contributing to the postpandemic recovery? (Rose Barton) When we found ourselves overnight confined to our homes, the importance of being in nature was thrown into sharp relief. Public green spaces, especially in towns and cities, have become essential to many of us.

Landscapes are now more valuable than ever.

This is reflected in the value our clients are putting on their outdoor spaces; from local primary schools asking for more natural play-scapes, getting children back to nature, to Pitlochry Festival Theatre, who are adapting their grounds to accommodate outdoor performances. Landscape architecture is helping to bridge the gaps left in our daily > lives by lockdown.

RankinFraser’s approach at DundasHill adopts a long-term view for the greening of brownfield land

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LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE

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Left - A well-plumed Roman helmet forms part of efforts to connect visitors to history through a heady mix of sculpture and wayfinding Right - LUC developed replica Roman distance stones bringing the past to life at the Antonine Wall

Samuel Cortis Consultant Landscape Architect LUC Are we witnessing a shift from global trends & fashion to greater localism?

The pandemic may have accelerated trends towards a more digital and globalised world, but it also heightened our awareness of the importance of community and local resources. As we have learned from our isolation, we are innately social beings, so our ever more technologically advanced world needs to be tempered with a greater emphasis upon localism. At LUC, we have developed a new digital consultation ‘room’ which has enabled people to maintain their active role in local decision making. That being said, we look forward to engaging with local groups face-to-face soon!

How is Landscape Architecture contributing to postpandemic recovery?

The pandemic has changed the way in which we use urban spaces. Empty roads were transformed overnight into

cycle lanes and people began to rely on their local parks for exercise and wellbeing. During this recovery phase, Landscape Architecture should be focused on addressing green space inequality, so that everyone has access to high quality green spaces which are integrated into the urban landscape through active travel routes. Design should be focused on improving the lived experience of our cities for all.

What project exemplifies the future of landscape design?

At LUC we recognise that the spaces we design need to function on many levels, as high-quality places for nature and people. A project that typifies our approach is the Toryglen project in Glasgow, a historically deprived neighbourhood which has been annexed by major road and rail infrastructure. Working with Green Infrastructure and Sustrans funding, we enhanced the local nature reserve and helped to revitalise the local neighbourhood through an integrated active travel network. We also created a new park on previously derelict land with play and sport provisions, all of which was informed by our intensive community consultation program. >

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LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE

Sheena Raeburn Director Raeburnfarquharbowen How is landscape architecture responding to the demands of active travel, wellbeing & social distancing?

An example of how we are approaching this is in the transformation of Rottenrow gardens and surrounding streets for the University of Strathclyde.

This will revitalise Rottenrow gardens and make the surrounding streets more friendly to people walking and cycling by reducing vehicle access and making more attractive spaces available. Environmental improvements will provide a climateresilient landscape to positively manage rainwater across the site through a series of terraced raingardens, reducing the burden on the city sewer infrastructure, as well as extending biodiverse, pollinator-friendly habitats for wildlife. Improved lighting across the space will improve safety and visibility. Many new social spaces and seating for relaxing, studying or socialising with embedded wifi will encourage students, staff, visitors and citizens of the city to enjoy this significant green space at the heart of the city centre.

A bespoke timber covered walkway with biodiverse green roof will provide, from east to west a critical link across the campus.

What can the profession contribute to the climate conversation as we approach COP-26?

We continue to develop our portfolio of projects driven by ‘One Planet’ principles. Clients, funders and society are realising that the time for compromising on sustainability is passed; we will enable truly sustainable re-creation of place. More and more of our work will be with local communities and we must be imaginative and energetic in the techniques we use to engage with them.

We believe that there will be a growing emphasis on green infrastructure retro-fitting to improve environmental, social and economic conditions. 80% of the homes that we will have in 2050 are already built, and are accompanied by huge swathes of urban and suburban landscapes of unrealised potential. Converting this legacy into a multi-functional, valued and delightful environment will be an area of focus by government and housing providers.

How is landscape architecture contributing to the postpandemic recovery?

We strongly believe in collaboration and early engagement with local communities, where we build relationships to understand what people feel about their environment, how they use the space and what difficulties they experience, so that we can support their aspirations and ideas for improvements. This partnership approach extends to how we like to work with our clients, stakeholders and professional peers to develop a lively synergy.

Waverley Park in Glasgow, Meadowbank masterplan in Edinburgh and Woodside Making Places,in Glasgow are current projects reflective of this approach. > URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

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Raeburnfarquharbowen show there really is gold at the end of the rainbow in Woodside, Glasgow

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LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE

Kincardine is putting its best foot forward following the closure of Longannet Power Station by re-establishing the historic High Street as the beating heart of the community. Active travel links to nearby woodland and the waterfront will reconnect locals with the towns industrial and natural resources

Mike Harrison Creative Director and Co-Founder HarrisonStevens How have perceptions and the utility of green spaces shifted over the past year?

When the pandemic struck and travel became restricted, every patch of grass within our towns and cities gained added significance, providing space to get outdoors, connect with people at a safe distance and to allow nature to work its healing effects. An opportunity to explore and find adventure on our doorsteps.

Results from numerous studies showed that perceptions about the benefits of these green spaces rose significantly, with 40% of people recognising their importance and nine out of 10 acknowledging their positive impact on mental health and wellbeing.

With large parts of the population spending more than two hours a week in nature, the impact of the work we do as landscape architects and designers to maximise the unique health-giving potential of every site becomes ever more relevant, and a fantastic opportunity for our profession.

How is landscape architecture responding to the demands of active travel, wellbeing & social distancing?

The events of the last 18 months have highlighted the work that was already underway to take back the urban landscape and what began as responses to Covid 19 are now being integrated into long-term green recovery strategies.

In Falkirk, Sighthill and at Roseburn, on the west side of Edinburgh, we are already engaged in transforming canal URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

towpaths, redundant railway tracks and quay edge urban scrub into active travel routes, with new play, communal growing areas, and integrated sustainable drainage systems, offering spaces that allow people to be active and to be together.

Routes like these provide longer distance paths that connect rural urban fringe areas to the city, bringing people closer to nature and making local amenities accessible on foot or by bike, while in cities we are seeing the emergence of ‘people first’ designs, where pedestrians are given priority in the streetscape.

Are we witnessing a shift from global trends & fashions to greater localism?

When life retreated from city centres a new dynamic began to emerge as people started to re-engage with their local communities. This cherishing of what’s on our doorsteps has been enshrined in the philosophies of the ‘15 minute city’ and the ’20 minute neighbourhood,’ where people can live, work, shop, find education, health facilities and entertainment within walking or cycling distance of where they live.

The High Street may not be dead but it is being redefined and while a change of planning policy may be needed to encourage creative ways of reinvigorating it, there are already examples of shuttered shops being flattened to make space for parks and community growing spaces. As an Expert on the High Street Task Force we see the evidence of behavioural change pre Covid and the challenge to us all is to evolve our local centres to adapt, thrive and flourish in their unique way.

Local vibrancy is very much in the ascendance.

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11 South Charlotte Street Edinburgh EH2 4AS Tel: +44 131 226 2672 Email: hello@HarrisonStevens.co.uk Web: www.harrisonstevens.co.uk Twitter: @HSLimited Year of Incorporation: 2010 No. of staff: 12

Kincardine, Places for Everyone Well-conceived communities have the power to improve the health and wellbeing of residents, especially when local people are involved in their design.

In Fife , the Kincardine Places for Everyone project demonstrates how effective a co-design process can be in delivering an outcome that puts people and not vehicles first and creates a safe, attractive and engaging space that makes the town a better place to be for everyone.

One of the main goals of the project was for people of all ages to reclaim the High Street, which had become dominated by buses and cars, and it was recognised that restricting vehicular access, widening footpaths and adding new seating areas would benefit both young and elderly people, making the street more accessible and inclusive. The improvements offer safe spaces to socialise.

Creating rain gardens with play elements would provide a sense of fun and encourage families to spend more time on the High Street, which in turn would boost commercial activity, helping to stimulate and sustain local businesses.

Active travel is another key component of the design, helping to reduce pollution and improving health and wellbeing. The principle is to ensure there are safe routes for cycling as an unaccompanied 12 year old. New designated cycle routes are proposed through the High Street and connect to destinations such as the primary school, local shops and health care centres. The long distance Fife Coastal Path is connected into the centre of the town through these proposed cycle routes.

HarrisonStevens are award-winning landscape architects and urban designers with an international reputation for maximising the unique potential of every site.

Founded in 2010 with a resolve to be a force for good, the expert team collaborates with clients and communities to deliver engaging and responsive environments where people and biodiversity can flourish.

The practice is curious by nature, creating streetscapes, campuses, regeneration schemes, parks, and green/ blue infrastructure landscape corridors that enhance biodiversity and are rooted in their locations.

This is underpinned by a responsible approach towards protecting natural resources, working with communities, partnerships and local government to redefine and transform places that make a positive contribution.

Recent Projects: • Custom House Quay, Glasgow • North Minster, Peterborough • Papdale Park, Kirkwall • Newcastle Cathedral, Newcastle • Wavegarden, Ratho Awards: • Kincardine Places for Everyone, Scottish Design Awards Shortlist for Future Project/Building 2021 • Kings Stables Road and Calton Hill Observatory, Scottish Design Awards Shortlist 2020 • Calton Hill Observatory, Regional Finalist Civic Trust Awards 2020

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LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE

2nd Floor, Ailsa Court, 121 West Regent Street, Glasgow, G2 2SD Tel: +44 (0) 141 226 8320 Email: lorraine.robertson@hlmarchitects.com Web: www.hlmarchitects.com Twitter: @hlmarchitects Year of Incorporation: 18 February 2004 No. of staff: 185 Our design philosophy puts people at its centre. We use our creativity to unlock the potential within each project to be the best it can, often working within strict financial restrictions, and always thinking about the whole life of a project, along with the impact on the people who will experience it. It is our mission to delight as well as satisfy our clients and that often means going beyond the brief, being innovative, and thinking about people’s emotional response to the built environment. We strive to create buildings that respond to their context and climate, Recent Projects: • University of Glasgow – James McCune Smith Learning Hub • voco Grand Central Hotel, Glasgow • Royal Hospital for Children & Young People and Department of clinical Neurosciences • University of Strathclyde, The National Manufacturing Institute Scotland Awards • Finalist, Scottish Design Awards 2021, Education Building & Healthcare Building • Winner, RICS Social Impact Awards Scotland, Education Award – University of Glasgow’s Campus Development of which HLM’s James McCune Smith Learning Hub is part of. 2020 • Shortlisted, RICS Social Impact Awards Scotland, Student Accommodation Category – St Andrews Student Accomodation • Best Companies – 3rd Best Architectural Practice to work for in the UK 2021 • Winner, Architectural Practice of the Year, Building Awards 2020 • Winner, Employer of the Year AJ100 Awards 2020 URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

University of Sheffield – The Concourse Client: University of Sheffield Regeneration of a 1970s designed public open space located at the centre of the University’s campus, the scheme has brought the underused space back to life as a vibrant, social and meaningful space.

The Concourse has been transformed from an intimidating thoroughfare into a vibrant, active and inviting civic space at the centre of the campus. The design has given the space identity and provides legibility, gathering space and hosts events from graduation to music and food festivals.

The scheme includes 3000m2 of new paving, bespoke seating and planting design that responds to the site conditions, providing seasonal impact. The HLM Landscape team worked with Arup Lighting to create a vibrant public realm scheme with integrated lighting.

The University’s high sustainability and waste management standards were an intrinsic part of the design. Materials used to include the weathering steel, timber, concrete seating and paving, were selected for their recycled and renewable material content and measured against the environmental management life cycle assessment. The project was a finalist in the Civic Trust Awards 2020.

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37 Otago Street, Glasgow, G12 8JJ Tel: 0141 334 9595 Email: glasgow@landuse.co.uk Atholl Exchange, 6 Canning Street, Edinburgh, EH3 8EG Tel: 0131 202 1616 Email: edinburgh@landuse.co.uk Web: landuse.co.uk Twitter: @LUCtweeting Year of incorporation: 1966 No. of staff: 208 LUC is an award-winning environmental consultancy providing planning, impact assessment, landscape design, ecology and geospatial services to a wide range of public and private sector clients. We are a team of over 200 skilled professionals, united by a determination to achieve sustainable development on behalf of our clients. We are passionate about the power of good planning and landscape design; working to improve the lives of communities across the UK and beyond since our very first project 55 years ago. We care about the legacy we leave and hope to make a real difference through the work we do.

Antonine Wall Replica Roman Distance Stones Client: West Dunbartonshire Council LUC was commissioned by West Dunbartonshire Council as lead landscape architects for the display of five replica ‘Roman Distance Stones’ at sites across the Antonine Wall. We produced design proposals for siting and interpretation of the stones, including small landscape and environmental improvements.

The Antonine Wall was the northernmost frontier of the Roman Empire, constructed in AD 142. It spanned 39 miles between Old Kilpatrick and Bo’ness, and featured carved stone slabs which celebrated the achievements of the Roman Legions responsible for each section of the wall.

Our designs for each site involved site visits and assessments, desktop research, and concept development. These designs were subject to community consultation and local authority and stakeholder feedback.

We also developed concepts for two sculptural Roman ‘heads’ which are located in two prominent sites at Nethercroy and Lambhill Stables. These distinctive landmarks have raised awareness of the Antonine Wall, and have become popular local attractions.

Our work is part of the wider ‘Rediscovering the Antonine Wall’ project, funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, the Kelvin Valley & Falkirk LEADER Programme, five local authorities and Historic Environment Scotland.

Sculpture art by Svetlana Kondakova in collaboration with Gordon Simpson of Big Red Blacksmiths.

Recent Projects and Awards: 2020 • Civic Trust Award, University of Northampton’s Waterside Campus, Highly Commended • CIHT, Employer of the Year, Commended • Housing Design Award, Rochester Riverside Phase 1B, Building for a Healthy Life • Housing Design Award, Rochester Riverside Phase 1B, Winner of Winners • Planning Awards, Planning Consultancy of the Year, Highly Commended • RTPI South West Award, Minerals Local Plan for Gloucestershire, Commended • Landscape Institute Awards, Gallions Park Play Area, Thamesmead 2019 • Family Friendly Working Scotland, Best for Flexible Recruitment • RTPI Planning Consultancy of the Year • East Midlands Property Dinner Awards, University of Northampton’s Waterside Campus, Construction Project of the Year • Scottish Green Energy Awards, Canna Renewable Energy and Electrification

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LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE

Codebase Stirling, 8-10 Corn Exchange Road, Stirling FK8 2HX Tel: 01786 446446 Email: studio@raeburnfarquharbowen.com Web: raeburnfarquharbowen.com Twitter: @rfblandscape Year of Incorporation: 2011 No. of staff: 10 We are outward facing and have developed a strong network of links across diverse platforms. We contribute to and influence debates, policy and academia, as well as speaking at events and writing articles. We provide expert landscape advice to the Design Council, National Lottery Heritage Fund and Design Panels for Architecture + Design Scotland. Our studio values integrity and critical thinking.

We design a lasting legacy of durable, rich and delightful spaces for people and nature.The studio is a registered practice with the Landscape Institute and we are also a certified Assessor for the Building with Nature standard, benchmarking high quality green infrastructure.

Recent Projects and Awards: • NHS Forth Valley Hospital and Larbert Woods. Winner of inaugural National Building with Nature Award 2020.

Recognised as a national exemplar of green infrastructure and a model for NHS estates and other healthcare facilities.

• Bertha Park, Perth - Blue Green Infrastructure – Springfield Developments. Winner in the Susdrain Awards 2020 in the New Build Large Scale SuDS category • Wanderings and Windings, Inner Forth Futures (IFF).

• Queensland Gardens & Court, Glasgow – Southside Housing Association. Building with Nature Full Award Excellent 2021.

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Waverley Park Collective, Glasgow Community Group We have developed proposals for a low traffic neighbourhood to prioritise people movement and reduce the impact of rat-running traffic. Design options focus on creating safer crossing points, introducing enabling features to support sustainable accessible travel for everyone. This supports the concept of a 20 minute neighbourhood, with Shawlands and Strathbungo a short distance away.

Travel by foot and by bike to and from Shawlands Primary and Shawlands Academy is important to the success of the designs - we aim to provide safe and comfortable streets for the most vulnerable road users. Designs include traffic-free links at important crossing points to the wider transport network, and more generous waiting areas give opportunity for socially distanced waiting space.

Rain gardens deal with surface water flows, complimenting the historic suburban context and contributing towards climate adaptability. Fun elements weave through the rain gardens and street interventions, with ‘play-on-the-way’ features such as boulders, balance beams and hopping logs supporting active multigenerational play. Street closures would give opportunity for safe playful streets, where children and adults can be part of an active community.

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8 Darnaway Street, Edinburgh EH3 6BG Tel: 0131 226 7071 Email: mail@rankinfraser.com Web: rankinfraser.com Twitter: @rankinfraserLLP Year of Incorporation: 2008 No. of staff: 11 We seek to design landscapes that are deeply rooted in their cultural, social and spatial context regardless of scale. We believe in the timeless beauty of simplicity, referencing Dieter Rams 10 Principles of Good Design; especially the maxim that, “Good design is as little design as possible”.

In the context of designing landscapes this translates into an approach that prioritises the importance of site along with a detailed and thorough understanding of the components that constitute the character of the place. Building upon this research and understanding we seek to combine a tectonic approach that focuses on careful material selection and detailing with a strategic understanding of the wider landscape character.

DundasHill Landscape Framework The regeneration of Dundashill in Glasgow has been stimulated through the innovative development of a blue/green/grey landscape framework in advance of the development of individual plots. The masterplan framework also informed the detailed design and construction of the subsequent green, blue and grey landscape framework. The landscape infrastructure framework includes; • a network of new public spaces, streets and footpaths that re-purpose the site’s infrastructure and enhances pedestrian connectivity • an earth works strategy that dealt with site contamination whilst keeping all material on site, limiting material taken to land fill • an innovative SUDS network of swales, rain gardens and retention basins expressed in the public realm • a new ‘canal’ on the southern edge of the site that plays a key role in managing the surface water drainage via a smart technology activated drainage connection, allowing storm water to discharge into the Forth and Clyde Canal • an extensive framework of woodland planting, street trees and shelter belts to further define individual development plots and improve the site’s micro-climate • incorporation of several remnants of the industrial history into the public realm such as the vast concrete ‘bunker’ and brick retaining walls • reshaped landform to create a series of usable amenity spaces that can be further developed over time for active play and recreation

Recent Projects & Awards: 2021 • Strawberry Field, Liverpool Selwyn Goldsmith Award for Universal Design • The Dunbar Battery 5th European Architectural Heritage Award, Shortlisted • Scotland +Venice Contributor to ‘What if ... Scotland’ Venice Biennale 2020 2020 • DundasHill Landscape and Public Realm Scottish Design Awards, Winner, Landscape and Public Realm.

Landscape Institute Awards, Finalist • The Garden at Strawberry Field, Liverpool Scottish Design Awards, Shortlisted 2019 • Kesson Court Landscape Design Scottish Design Awards Winner, Landscape and Public Realm • The Knab Masterplan Lerwick Scottish Design Awards Winner, Masterplanning • Western Harbour Park and Masterplan Scottish Design Awards Highly Commended, Future Project • DundasHill Landscape and Public Realm Scottish Design Awards Nomination, Future Project

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DESIGNING FROM THE ROOF DOWN SIG Design & Technology’s specification manager for Scotland, Andrew Jennings, offers best practice guidance for designing and delivering a longlasting, fit-for-purpose roof that does more than keep the rain out.

With so many roofing systems available there is never a ‘one size fits all’ solution and finding the correct solution can be challenging. Considerations follow a structured approach; establishing the client’s brief, ensuring compliance, finding the solution, installing the membrane to the highest standard and finally robust guarantees.

Establish the client’s brief The first stage is about asking the right questions. What does the client need this specific roof to do? Be clear about what you’re trying to achieve in terms of fire rating, u-values, warranty periods, third-party accreditations, environmental considerations and aesthetics.

In spatial terms, roofs can be highly efficient in providing easily accessible space for services such as photovoltaic panels or plant equipment. Terraces can be added as an important amenity area or a green roof to optimise the structural footprint of the building.

Ensure the specification addresses every stage of the build-up.

Finding the solution With so many different pitched and flat roofing systems available finding the right solution can be challenging.

Specifiers should engage with a roofing expert at the earliest possible stage who can design an engineered solution specific to the project. They should have local Specification Managers who are conversant in the requirements for your region and can identify areas that require attention.

With a typical roof build-up potentially using materials from multiple manufacturers there is the potential for clashes between their designs, this can make the whole process very messy. Ideally you want the roof designed, specified from the deck up by a single PI-insured designer who will ensure it meets current legislation and building standards and works around appropriate interface details.

On the roof Good communications between the main contractor, supplier and roofing contractor are essential for a smooth-running programme. If there is no coordinated approach to the supply of materials and specific site requirements, this can delay

Web: www.singleply.co.uk

URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

works and delay the programme.

Work with accredited contractors who are trained and understand the products they use. They should receive ongoing support from their supplier who can liaise with the project team on specific site requirements and project sequencing.

Your supplier should also provide a maintenance plan to include regular scheduled inspections, detect any damage as early as possible, and cleaning intervals to ensure flat roofs meet and surpass their guarantee.

8 Steps to the Perfect Roof At SIG Design & Technology we offer a free, impartial design and supply service to specifiers. We offer a genuinely independent choice of roofing solutions for flat, green and blue roofing, hard metal roofing and cladding and pitched roof coverings including natural slate and clay tiles. This enables us to not only recommend the right product for the job, but also provide a smooth, confident guiding hand from construction right through to maintenance phase.

DAISY NARAYANAN

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JOHN GLENDAY

Daisy Narayanan carries responsibility for marrying mobility and placemaking on her shoulders

THE CITY OF EDINBURGH COUNCIL HAS FOUND A FIGUREHEAD IN THE SOFTLY SPOKEN FORM OF DAISY NARAYANAN TO GUIDE THE CITY TOWARD THE PROMISED LAND OF A CARBON NEUTRAL FUTURE BY 2030. AS SENIOR MANAGER FOR MOBILITY AND PLACEMAKING NARAYANAN WILL FUSE LANDSCAPE AND TRANSPORT TO BRING PEOPLE CLOSER DURING AN ERA OF SOCIAL DISTANCING. Charged with fusing the City of Edinburgh’s placemaking and transport strategies, as Senior Manager for Mobility and Placemaking, urbanist Daisy Narayanan is at the forefront of efforts to meet the city’s ambitious carbon neutrality targets by 2030, and ensuring that the capital emerges from the pandemic as a greener and a healthier place.

With a lifetime’s passion for architecture and urban design, Narayanan is also experienced, having worked across the UK and Asia. She first arrived in Britain in 2004 as a student, quickly establishing herself as a potent force for change through high-profile stints as director of urbanism at Sustrans, as well as serving the Edinburgh Climate Commission and the Climate Assembly Evidence Group.

Now, in her biggest role to date, Narayanan will put her passion and experience into practice on behalf of The City of Edinburgh Council. Having previously been seconded to the authority in 2018 and 2019 to lead Edinburgh’s ten-year city centre transformation plan, when she championed the introduction of a monthly carfree event in the Old Town, Narayanan is acutely aware of the responsibility she bears to all residents from the city centre World Heritage sites to the furthest flung residents in Sighthill. Her initiatives such as the City Mobility Plan for introducing carbon-neutral transport options and the 20-minute neighbourhood programme have helped to further her aims.

Speaking to Urban Realm following her appointment Narayanan said: “I brought a lot of my learning from >

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DAISY NARAYANAN

Edinburgh to Sustrans in terms of how we talk about walking and cycling and sustainable transport within a wider city-building agenda.

In a sense, it’s almost going back a few years. It’s so familiar but so much has changed since I was last here.

We’ve had the pandemic; we’ve had Black Lives Matter and we’ve had discussions around equity. In a sense for me that is where my focus will be, looking not just at the city centre. My focus is working with communities to find out what they’ve learned over the past year.”

Having grown up in Mumbai Narayanan is no stranger to acute environmental and traffic pressures but Edinburgh faces a very particular set of challenges, including the climate emergency, inclusion, equity and bringing communities together to explore the future of their neighbourhoods.

Asked how the intervening years have helped to shape her world view Narayanan said: “We’ve had a chance to reassess our values and perceptions of our places, how we live and where we live. I have two young children and watching how places have changed through their eyes has helped my thinking evolve. There’s so much inequity built into how our cities are developed from the transport system to housing. For me the focus has shifted from creating beautiful places to inclusive places, it’s not very different but it focuses the lens on how we engage with people.

“Before the pandemic, there was a programme called Spaces for People which travelled across Scotland. For me, there is a lot to be learned from that in how we shape communities going forward. We have a chance to come together and change, we need to come together and collaborate. It sounds cheesy but it’s the only way forward.”

Asked what the biggest stumbling blocks are to achieving these aims Narayanan replied “Nobody wants to live somewhere that isn’t good. Everybody wants spaces and cities to be the best that they can be but there are different ways of going about that. There are always going to be challenges around finance and solid thinking and pacing. The pandemic has allowed us to switch off from how things used to be done to how they can change very quickly due to circumstances.

“It’s not always easy to discuss taking away car parking spaces from businesses because that’s what everybody is used to. But when we talk about evidence and say ‘here is what happened to places that have done this it changes the narrative and idea of what a street is meant to be.

“Transport is political. Over the past years at Sustrans, I’ve learned that politics has to be taken out of placemaking as far as possible to get city leaders and elected members to agree. Elected members are there to URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

serve their communities and everybody wants the best but they have different ways to approach it.”

In a world where long-term thinking is normally tied to election cycles pushing the goalposts back a decade to 2030 when global warming is likely to reach 1.5C above pre-industrial levels, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), is vital if there is to be any hope of addressing the climate crisis.

One factor in Edinburgh’s favour is its compactness which makes it well-positioned to act quickly and

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Sustrans spearheaded this 160-tonne steel bridge spanning the 100m width of the Black Cart to connect Inchinnan, Renfrew & Paisley with new pedestrian and cycle infrastructure

decisively to transport a dense population. Can the city serve as an international exemplar? “Absolutely. It’s a magnificent city and it’s a privilege to be working in a world heritage site. The medieval streets of the old town were never built for tourist buses but neither were places outwith the centre such as Gorgie, Stockbridge and Granton.

“It’s a timeless city and my role is to change it slightly for the better and then hand it on to the next generation.

We’re so well positioned in geography and the places we

have.”

As horizons shrink in tandem with the shutdown of international travel we’re all more appreciative of our local environment and living our lives at a slower pace. Can these societal shifts feed through to what you’re doing and accelerate your goals? With tourists gone, what’s it like to have the city to yourself at last! “Learning from other cities such as Paris everything is changing and we have the opportunity to shape some of that change”, says Narayanan. “So let’s make sure we have options >

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DAISY NARAYANAN

Left - As deputy director for the built environment at Sustrans Narayanan helped deliver The South City Way in Glasgow Right - The £6.5m active travel route stretches from Victoria Road to the Stockwell Street junction in the Merchant City

for people who want to hop on their bike. Let’s put in infrastructure for people. My kids have been cycling on city-centre streets which they wouldn’t have before. You can hear birdsong, the sounds of the city have changed.”

“I sit on Scotland’s Climate Assembly’s Evidence Group and there is something powerful about evidence and engagement coming together to remove some of the misinformation that you see on social media. To bring transport and planning together in the way the council has done is brilliant and something we’ve been saying for a long time as urbanists. We need to have fewer silos and more collaboration.”

By November Narayanan hopes to be in a position to reveal some concrete ambitions for her adopted city but in the meantime, she is undertaking a series of URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

conversations around what people want. Refusing to be drawn on her preferences a diplomatic Narayanan promises to oversee as collegiate a role as possible but if 100 people in a room give 100 different answers, how can you tap into the embodied energy and passions of individuals without the machinery seizing up from conflicting agendas?

“I’m not here to design the city centre or say this is my vision. I’m here to bring people together and then set the direction,” says Narayanan. “Hopefully we find a consensus and we travel together on this journey.

Sometimes you have local authorities where everyone is so stressed and it becomes difficult to hold the message of why we are doing something. That is why it is so important that when people see bollards appearing on

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the streets that they understand why it is being done.

“It’s so tempting to push in certain directions. I have my preferences on how the city can be made more sustainable and attractive. I’m trying to hold myself back and the first step is listening to people and that will take a while. The regional aspect of making sure there are sustainable opportunities for people outside Edinburgh to reach the city is just as important as the fine urban fabric.”

Despite not having formally stepped into the role Narayanan has already had a foretaste of the type of pressures to be expected with her seven-year-old daughter wasting no time to inform her of every dropped kerb needing installed on the cycle to school. “Whenever she sees a dropped kerb she says, ‘mum can you please sort this out?’ I’ll be the one everyone wants to shout at!”

I came here in 2004 to do my master’s degree and I still remember coming out of Waverley and seeing the World Heritage skyline, that moment stays with you for life. As someone who made Scotland my home, I can’t believe I have the opportunity to shape how the city will be. I’m here for a blip in the timeline of the city and I don’t want to change what makes the city special.”

With an international outlook and an approachable nature, Narayanan is well placed to navigate the competing interests to be found in a city where commercial and heritage pressures combine with the often-divergent needs of locals and visitors to present a headache for policymakers. At a pivotal moment in history, Edinburgh’s mobility and placemaking strategy are in good hands.

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BIENNALE ARCHITETTURA

WHAT I F ... ?

SCOTLAND’S CONTRIBUTION TO THE 2021 VENICE BIENNALE IS A HOMEGROWN AFFAIR IN MORE WAYS THAN ONE. IT EXPLORES HOW WE CAN LIVE TOGETHER AT A TIME WHEN WE HAVE ALL BEEN PUSHED APART BY CASTING PREVIOUS BOUNDARIES AND CONSTRAINTS ASIDE. PHOTOGRAPHY

BY BASH ART CREATIVE

By swapping Venice for Dundee, Scotland’s contribution to the 2021 Biennale Architettura has moved closer to the people, capitalising on the pandemic to shed its elitist glamour in favour of a notably more grounded affair on soggy home soil.

Held within the angular embrace of the V&A What if...?/ Scotland will run until 21 November, inviting members of the public through its doors to post their built environment wishes in-person to an on-site wishing well. Banishing preconceptions and opening the door to all it is as democratic a process as possible, dispensing with the paternal approach of setting out solutions in favour of taking a step back and asking ‘How will we live together?’

Curated by 7N Architects in partnership with Architecture & Design Scotland the free exhibition is the culmination of a novel one-to-one programme of mentorship that paired 25 individuals chosen to represent five separate places with a dedicated companion drawn from the fields of architecture, art and design. In this way, individual wishes could be interpreted and conceptualised in a form that might be picked up by the powers that be for follow-through action.

With places that include a town, a city, a. village, an island and a rural community the five locations range from Wester Hailes in Edinburgh to Paisley in Renfrewshire, Annan in Dumfries and Galloway, Elgin in Morayshire, and Lerwick in Shetland; seeding a process that has resulted in an eclectic melting pot of ideas ranging from a night market to boost the after-hours economy of Elgin to a pop-up theatre in Annan.

Documenting the grassroots process, a series of short films by > URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

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Lynne Russell gains a fresh perspective of Annan High Street courtesy of a Beautiful Materials designed stool

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BIENNALE ARCHITETTURA

Basharat Khan seed further discussions among visitors with the exhibition environment itself designed to inspire and encourage quiet reflection of what is possible when we are freed from all constraints.

Speaking to Urban Realm at the launch project lead Ewan Anderson of 7N Architects said: “I’m pleased it’s here.

I was initially disappointed that it wasn’t going to Venice but it just makes so much sense beyond the Covid restrictions.

Fundamentally this is about advocacy and making the case for more direct involvement between architects and communities to establish a shared vision and how that can gain more traction in the planning and delivery process.”

This collegiate approach stands in stark contrast to the combative nature of the planning process which can place design professionals at loggerheads with the communities they work in, widening a gap between the profession and the public. Anderson said: “You could view the planning process as a fundamentally confrontational process. Rather than proposals being put forward and people reacting to them wouldn’t it be better if local place plans came out of proper community engagement? Not just ‘what do you think about this proposal?’ but ‘what do you want your place to be like in 20/30 years?’

“That is happening in some places such as Loch Lomond & The Trossachs where charette work we’ve undertaken with the URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

National Park Authority has formed the basis of its local plan but it doesn’t happen that often. It’s always been placed in the too difficult category. After coming out of lockdown and the extraordinary events of the past two years I don’t think it can be placed in the too difficult category anymore. It’s essential.”

By staging an exhibition of what can be achieved where a spirit of common purpose is allowed to flourish Anderson hopes to seed a broader discussion that generates ideas as a direct response to people’s wishes. In the process, Anderson believes that it makes a compelling case for the civic value that architects bring to communities while helping rediscover the soul of architecture.

By adopting a one-to-one pairing of architects and citizens the What If team aims to get to the core of what makes people with the greatest stake in spaces tick. “We’ve stripped away all the layers and processes involved in realising places to bring it down to the hopes and dreams a community has and how an architect can respond to that,” says Anderson. “It’s about making people feel more connected and enfranchised in the future of their places but it also shows the value of architects and designers to make places better. That’s about making the case for the profession as much as anything. It’s about trying to reposition the profession to offer something critical to the future of the country.”

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Left - Designers and architects teamed up with locals to develop actionable ideas. Right - Nicola Atkinson of Beautiful Materials worked with Callum McDougall to devise a Together brand for Annan that could unite generations

Is it fair to say there’s been an element of distancing in recent years, has there been a slow, broad retreat? “Yes, the size of the bureaucratic machine involved in delivering places has only grown. How can we strip all that back and deliver someone’s wishes for the future? That often gets lost in the process but it shouldn’t.”

Is there an issue that in reaching out with one question you will receive a multitude of different responses? How did the process of selecting individuals work? “The five places were picked because either ourselves or A&DS had connections with them. It was partly to renew initiatives going on in those places but also there was an established network. There is a host in each

place who was the connection and who picked a cross-section of local citizens who would respond positively. Ourselves and A&DS picked the architects to give a leg-up to younger practices and more established practices who we knew would give it a lot of thought.”

While an open-ended question can elicit the broadest range of responses it can also lack focus, was it felt necessary to impose any boundaries or constraints to help channel the process? “We didn’t set any boundaries, it’s deliberately broadranging”, remarks Anderson. “We didn’t want to constrain it by their being a particular delivery route. The wish came first. You can say, so what? This is just a bunch of ideas but the primary >

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Above - The team on patrol scouting out potential and problems on the streets of Elgin Below - Niamh O’Reilly at 7N led the Elgin workshops, which included options for a new public venue

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An outdoor market in Elgin would boost the after hours economy and satisfy social distancing requirements. Image by Claire Hope, Buro Happold.

purpose of the exhibition is one of advocacy, by showing what can be achieved by listening to the wishes of local people and placing architects more closely within those communities.

“It’s getting loads of attention from the press and TV, there will be events later in the year with local politicians so there will be government interest in it as well and we hope that this helps take that conversation forward.”

The key takeaway of the programme is engagement, giving people a stake in their immediate environment and a sense of empowerment that they have the means to make things better. “It’s more than just a voice”, adds Anderson. “There is a disenfranchisement issue which needs to be addressed but I think our experience from doing charrettes is that the challenge of doing these projects is always resources but the most valuable resource you could have is the energy of local people around a common cause and vision. If people feel that they can have an impact they will get involved and if they feel disenfranchised, they won’t.”

How did the process play out on the ground, were people enthusiastic to embrace the project or did you have to work to convince people that you had their best interests at heart? “By not going to a proposition and rather saying ‘well, what do you want it to be?’ that completely shifts the whole conversation.”

Another crucial factor behind the exhibition is that of timing, coinciding as it does with the many crises of today.

With collateral damage from these events building in the form of a collapse in the retail and leisure economy coupled with unprecedented demand for active travel and green space is it now time for tough choices to finally be taken?

Anderson says: “The past year of lockdown and dislocation has shown how much people value coming together and being with other people. The other thing this year has shown is the rules can be set aside and anything is possible. From furlough to vaccine development and the fact a lot of cycle lanes appeared virtually overnight. If you walk around any town or city at the moment you will see that the pavements have been >

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Above - Ewan Anderson led a Lerwick walkabout seeking responses to rising sea levels Below - Paisley’s challenges are of a different order with the community seeking ways to elevate local talent with help from 7N’s Ffion Roberts

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Above - The process has also helped to bridge divides in Wester Hailes Below - Rowan MacKinnon-Pryde and Nicky Thomson of Studio Niro looked at transforming a redundant petrol station into a community dining room

colonised by people enjoying a drink without any licenses or policy development. It just happened. If the spontaneity and inventiveness that has come from that need can be channelled then the question what if can become why not?

“It will be hard for those who control these processes to say ‘that’s too difficult’ after what everyone has been through.”

With such an open-ended brief, responses inevitably come in the form of broad strokes rather than clearly defined initiatives but through all the five places a general feeling of detachment was observed. Anderson said: “There’s a definite theme of disconnection even with most of this done pre-covid. There is a strong desire for more and better quality green space and that’s tied in with the sense of wellbeing.”

Ultimately the project can shift the narrative from conversations laced with doom and gloom around store closures and the rise of the online economy to one that seeks opportunities, sparking a long-overdue rethink of how places can better serve today’s needs. “The next crisis of the pandemic will be the economic impact on town centres”, foresees Anderson.

“That’s been a live issue for many years now and it’s moved from acute to critical. There are a lot of issues coming together to put town centres into A&E and we need to do something.”

With austerity set to return with a vengeance, another key aspect is to show that significant interventions need not carry a significant price tag. “The spirit of What If is not saying we have to do this. It’s saying what if we close this street off for a week and see what happens? There’s a positive tone to the wish rather than a need or requirement. It’s a positive statement with a spirit of hope. It’s non-challenging to say I have an idea to do something about this. So many of the adaptive things which have happened don’t cost anything. However, if a community has a clear idea of where it wants to go then resources can be

funnelled toward that goal.

“Terry Farrell as city design champion of Edinburgh talked about visions as the picture on the jigsaw box, which means all the individual pieces are contributing toward that vision even if it might not seem so initially. People are engaged by ideas, people get enthused and that’s what drives things forward, not policy documents.”

By harnessing an innate desire to reshape the world around us and leave it in a better condition than we found it, What If shows that whether you’re ten or 80 a better tomorrow can be achieved but only for those willing to take the first step in their imaginations.

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ARCHITECTURE FRINGE

SAL T OF THE EARTH THE CLIMATE CRISIS PROVIDES FERTILE GROUND FOR THE ARCHITECTURE FRINGE UNLEARNING PROGRAMME WHICH SEEKS TO UPEND THE STATUS QUO. AMONG THOSE CHAMPIONING CHANGE IS PHINEAS HARPER WHO BELIEVES THE SOLUTION TO EVER RISING CARBON EMISSIONS LIES BENEATH OUR FEET. CAN DIRT REMEDY OUR DIRTY HABITS?

The Architecture Fringe is back in action with a programme of events based on the concept of ‘unlearning’ entrenched architectural tropes to eliminate behaviours and biases affecting everything from maintenance to diversity and climate.

Running over 16 days (Un)Learning heard from practitioners including Enough!, Neil Pinder, Missing in Architecture, Migrant’s Bureau and Decolonising Architecture to match the increasingly urgent need for change with a growing desire among those in the field to do things better.

Explaining the need for intervention Fringe co-director Liane Bauer said: “The programme investigates the defining issues of our generation, from whiteness, race and capitalism, to how we use and care for the land. As built environment professionals we are asking how do we change > URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

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The Power Structures photographic exhibition explores the socioeconomic and political factors that underpin construction © HASHEM SHAKERI

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ARCHITECTURE FRINGE

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New Spatial Realities explored the provision of more equitable spaces

our behaviours and biases to work in a more ethical, holistic and sustainable way?”

Opening proceedings for with an address on (Un) caring Phineas Harper, director of Open City, made an impassioned call for architecture to be refashioned from the ground up, chiefly by rediscovering the value of earth as a construction commodity. Echoing the enthusiasm of RIBA Gold Medal Winner David Adjaye for the treasure beneath our feet (see pg 58) Harper makes the back to basics case to save the planet to save ourselves. “Of the (1,121) World Heritage Sites more than 160 are built wholly or partially from earth. For 10,000 years earth has been one of the most widely used construction materials on the planet. What’s weird is that despite its vanishingly small carbon footprint earth is almost completely absent from contemporary architecture, young architects are rarely being tutored in how to design with adobe (mudbrick), cob or rammed earth. Instead, we are generally trained to use a narrow catalogue of highly processed, carbon rich materials such as cement which accounts for 7% of global carbon dioxide emissions.”

Tackling head-on the single biggest criticism of earth, that is to say, the regular maintenance required to keep it in shape, Harper turns things around by framing this weakness as a strength. “The materials which define our built landscape have often been chosen not for their ecological value but simply to do one thing, to reduce the burden of periodic maintenance. Thatched roofs have been tiled over, green spaces paved over and tarmac poured over cobbles.

In construction, there is a consensus that repairing things as little as possible is an important goal. When a material weathers badly we’re quick to chastise the architect for not having had the foresight to anticipate this deterioration and specify a more hard-wearing material.”

Citing Peter Barber’s Donnybrook in London as an example of how skewed our priorities have become Harper points to the outrage of critics who pointed to the peeling paint and flourishing mould growth as illustrative of the >

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The back to basics theme of the (un) programme disrupts the status quo

follies of designing bright white buildings for a damp northern climate such as the UK. “We claim that a careful architect anticipates maintenance requirements, and designs to avoid them”, he says.

“But I think this is the exact opposite of careful. To be full of care should mean to be very willing to check in with whatever we are caring for and demonstrate our care through many small acts of restoring and cultivation rather than seek to reduce our caring obligations entirely from the outset. That is not careful at all, that is careless. That is (un) care.”

Instead, Harper turns traditional arguments on their head, pointing out that a desire to not maintain and care for the fabric of buildings once they are built is can be viewed as ecologically and socially toxic. He explains: “It’s hard to think of many examples where this desire to not show acts of care is seen as a positive but it’s easy to think of the opposite.

“Think of a parent continually checking their new born child. Think of love-smitten teenagers who text and call each other hourly. Tink of the pious disciple who prays frequently to their God. Think of the gardener who must periodically prune, pick, water and weed. Metaphors URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

aside there is a strong ecological case to turn our backs on hardwearing materials and embrace an architecture of care and maintenance.”

Reinforcing his point Harper recollects an encounter with the architects of The Darwin Centre in London’s Natural History Museum, designed by C.F. Moller in 2009, as an example of the dichotomy between rhetoric and practice. “I visited as a student and they said this giant concrete egg, 60m long and 300mm thick was sustainable and I asked ‘what makes you think this is a sustainable building?’ The answer is that it will last for 200 years.

Even though it emits a lot of carbon from day 1 that’s fine because over 200 years that’s a low amount of carbon.

“It sounds sensible but it isn’t. We don’t have 200 years.

We have to reduce carbon emissions now. The implications of this for architecture are profound because it means there is no good in designing tough buildings which will last a long time at the expense of emitting a lot of carbon in their construction. That’s no longer a viable model.

Longevity robustness and solidity, the seductive values that we’ve associated with materials strategies over the years might have to be rethought or abandoned. The alternative to this is an architecture of care that requires constant

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© LUKE O’DONOVAN

maintenance as a design feature.”

Looking to the future by turning to the past Harper foresees more humble forms of architecture taking root as an antidote to more recent excesses, decoupling the building trade from the global commodities market by rediscovering local resources. “Thatch is as global as people and plants. A thatch roof would need to be replaced every 10 to 15 years but ecologically it’s better to replace this roof every decade than to build it once out of concrete,” says Harper.

“The Great Mosque of Djenne in Mali is covered in protruding rods which animate the facades and act as permanent scaffolding to enable the mud exterior of this earth brick building to be repaired after heavy rains. The Toleq houses in Cameroon (a type of domed earthen home) have this beautiful geometric patterning on the surface that tapers from 30cm to just 5cm in thickness.

“This pattern is not just decorative, it is also a threedimensional ladder that allows residents to clamber over the building and repair the mud facade. Both invoke a duality, an architectural expression that is both decorative and functional.”

Conscious of the need to avoid being seen as an old

© STEVE SMITH

Above - Ferrybridge Power Station symbolises our long addiction to coal Below - Aberdeen provided a case study for rethinking security, rights and shelter

stick in the mud Harper invokes the hi-tech style embodied

by Norman Foster’s HSBC building in Hong Kong as an example of capitalism getting it right with its rooftop cleaning gantries accentuating the vertical thrust of the Far East city’s virile skyline. “If cleaning can be a source of architectural expression why can’t maintenance as well?

Harper concludes: “Our addiction to minimising maintenance is a toxic desire to not care. If we’re going to (un)learn things let’s unlearn that desire and embrace slow, steady incremental and constant acts of care.”

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ALLAN MURRAY DESIGN JOHN GLENDAY

I DEAS

MAN

THE OPENING OF THE ST JAMES QUARTER IS A BIG MOMENT FOR EDINBURGH BUT ALSO NEATLY SUMS UP THE SUCCESS OF ONE PRACTICE, ALLAN MURRAY ARCHITECTS, IN RESHAPING THE CITY. NOW, WITH ITS CREATIVE FORCE AND FIGUREHEAD DEPARTING FOR ALLAN MURRAY DESIGN WE ASK HOW A MORE EXPLORATIVE IDEAS BASED PRACTICE CAN FRAME FUTURE URBAN PLACEMAKING.

“I’m not retiring!” declares a visibly frustrated Allan Murray as he seeks to scotch recent reports of his departure from the architecture scene. Indeed, far from putting his feet up and hitting the golf course Murray is more enthusiastic than ever about the power of ideas to drive change and has established a brand new practice, Allan Murray Design, to achieve just that.

Over recent decades no architect has come close to reshaping central Edinburgh to the degree that Murray has, overseeing large scale urban renewal projects from the newly opened St James Centre to New Waverley. His lesser works, such as the Royal Mile hotel, have achieved what others deemed impossible by assembling large tracts of land in the city’s World Heritage heart and driving his schemes through a notoriously fickle planning process.

With all eyes on St James however Murray has taken this moment to draw a line under his long association with the practice he founded in 1992, by launching a new design-led firm called Allan Murray Design. Since transferring possession to an employee ownership trust at the start of the year Allan Murray Architects has been run by managing director Connor Pitman with Murray no URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

longer playing any role in the company that still bears his name. He said: “A clean break was the right thing to do. It’s much more exciting than having to worry whether I create another £20m project.

“It’s a good natural ending with St James. This is the most exciting and fun project I’ve ever done but I’m interested in lots of different scales. I was working on a tiny little project in Somerset the other week. You might think ‘what are you doing here Allan? But it was in a sensitive historic site where you have to exercise your brain. That’s why I’m there, to be thoughtful. I’m not saying I didn’t do that at St James, I did. But it’s on a different scale.”

St James is the largest of a series of transformative projects reshaping the face of the Scottish capital, a mission in which Murray has invested 16 years of his life, but how has one man come to make the city his canvas?

“It’s not a rich uncle, it’s the power of an idea”, Murray says. Guiding Urban Realm to the former Eastern Scottish bus depot in New Street, he continued: “We were asked by clients to look at the bus station. It was a horrible building.

That was a problem but it was not the problem. The problem was we don’t connect to the city and integrate >

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within Edinburgh. I went to the interview and said ‘I think we need a bigger site here. Usually, clients will say we don’t have it but to their credit they said, what do you mean by that? We said well, here are the sites owned by the council. We need to talk to them about bringing those sites into a larger master plan. Instead of just the bus station site, we brought the depot and The Arches together.”

The ability to think big and offer clients, not what they necessarily asked for, but what they could have is a recurring theme in Murray’s work and an approach he encourages others to follow. “An architect simply providing a service is doing no service to the profession.

We need to bring innovation and ideas. Be lateral and say, ‘we can think like this’. Not everything’s going to happen but if you don’t do that it’s guaranteed nothing is going to happen. Architects need to go back to what we used to do. We were leaders of the process and thinkers. Rewrite the problem and make something better out of it.

“You’ve got to come up with an idea, otherwise you’re just saying hire us, we’ve done stuff before. We’ve done this before and we’ll be fine. It is not good enough.”

This approach focuses not on individual buildings but on spaces and the connections they open up, carving out a literal New Street and providing a new public square to give the dense city centre some breathing space. “There are a couple of object buildings which sit and hold space around them. The rest are bit players. I think of it like dropping an inkblot in water, there needs to be dissonance and that’s what makes the Old Town so interesting, it’s the hugger-mugger of what you don’t expect.”

This urban design strategy was inspired by a visit to the Piazza dell’Anfiteatro in Lucca, Italy, a public square bounded by buildings that follow the elliptical shape of a Roman amphitheatre. “It’s a beautiful enclosed space but you wouldn’t give tuppence for any of the buildings, none of them is particularly special. But wow, that space. It’s not about the architecture. We wanted to create a gathering space for festival events.”

Small flourishes are there to be found, notably a two-storey arched pend through to the Canongate. “It’s my favourite element”, states Murray. “I thought, how do I make a small thing at the front bigger at the back, like the TARDIS. You can stand there and see the whole of the Nelson Monument because the arch lifts.” > © ALLAN MURRAY DESIGN, PAD STUDIO, INEFFABLE TALE

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Murray is spearheading the creation of this coastal hotel complex in one of the first fruits of his new approach

ALLAN MURRAY DESIGN

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© ALLAN MURRAY DESIGN, PAD STUDIO, INEFFABLE TALE

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Left - A focus on experiment and ideas informed this housing project in Quatar Above - From the air the St James Quarter can be read as a natural extension of James Craig’s New Town

Still thinking big Murray is championing ideas drawn up for Network Rail at Waverley to top over the railway station with a proper 21st-century roof and bridges and restore the Nor Loch as part of an urban park. “These are ideas that are worth pushing forward. We have to regain the high ground in architecture and in doing that show, not just clients, that we can bring forward new ideas that are going to benefit the city environment and bring joy back.

The creative part of AMA was me.

“I’ve always believed in myself. It’s a prerequisite for being an entrepreneurial architect. I started with nothing.

When I came back from Harvard to Edinburgh the last project I did was a skyscraper, you want to do large-scale important work.”

“That’s why I’m starting a new practice and the key is in the last word. It’s about design. It’s about being able to experiment freely without being encumbered by what you’ve done before.” But with Allan Murray Architects you’ve got a huge team and the resources behind you, can’t you achieve more within that framework? “Not if no one else shares your values. The practice is led by me but the limit placed on how to experiment and innovate, when

people are less inclined to want to do that it makes for a difficult conversation. I felt constrained and I wanted more freedom to be creative.

“When I made the employee ownership trust I thought this was the right thing to do. The trouble is you make too many bosses. I’m going to continue with a lot more experimentation and innovation. I don’t need a huge outfit behind me to work on these ideas. I just need two or three people.”

Importantly for Murray, this newfound freedom opens the door to collaborations, such as with Hampshirebased Pad Studio as well as another unnamed Edinburgh practice. “This isn’t something that happened recently, I’ve been thinking about it for the past 10 years. Big projects are great but I’m keen to be a lot more focussed.”

Unifying the large-scale universe and the quantum world is a quandary that has stumped physicists for a generation but with Allan Murray Design, Murray believes he has discovered the correct equation for bridging the long-standing gulf between design-led and commercial practices. If he is successful it will provide a model for others to blaze a trail.

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TEAM ESTEEM

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The floor for the Esteem build was completed in just three hours, demonstrating the advantages of modular timber construction

H OME G R OWN CONSTRUCTION IS IN FULL SWING BEHIND AN INNOVATIVE CROSS LAMINATED TIMBER SOLAR HOME WHICH PROMISES TO ENERGISE RENEWABLES. URBAN REALM SPEAKS TO THE HERIOT WATT TEAM BEHIND THE PROTOTYPE BUILD TO SEE AT FIRST HAND HOW A MARRIAGE OF ARCHITECTURE AND ENGINEERING IS BREAKING NEW GROUND IN RESIDENTIAL DESIGN AT THE CONSTRUCTION SCOTLAND INNOVATION CENTRE.

Martin Juricek

What has been your experience so far in Team ESTEEM? I joined the project more than 2 years ago and shortly after became an Architecture team leader. This project has boosted my personal development in so many ways. I have learned how to communicate my ideas better, improved my leadership skills and learned how to keep people engaged even after switching into online meetings. I study Structural Engineering with Architectural Design but my degree focuses far more on its structural aspect than the architectural. By leading the architectural design team, I have been able to develop my design skills whist applying the engineering knowledge to the design. But above all, I have gained a lot of good friends that I have worked with over the past 2 years.

What are the most valuable aspects you are taking from this project to your professional career? I have developed a professional network of contacts within the industry. Even the variety of the courses my ESTEEM colleagues come from, future-proves my network within large variety of professions

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TEAM ESTEEM

in the industry. As a team leader I have often had to step out of my comfort zone and learn new skills to fulfil the tasks required from me, those often being things I never knew I would enjoy. I have a much clearer picture of what is required from me as a future professional and through applying new innovative construction methods materials on our house I have been able to gain an early inside into the future of sustainable construction.

What is your role in the prototype phase and what do you do? Besides making a lot of decisions affecting the aesthetics, I participate in the construction of the cross laminated panels at CSIC. Making those after 2 years of designing and discussing them has been a very proud and thrilling experience for me. I was lucky enough to participate in some of our big milestones - construction of our first and last CLT panels. Being at the forefront of our design team I have been trying to salvage every waste material to create items which compliment our interior.

How do you feel working in CSIC? Personally, I value the work at CSIC as an amazing opportunity to meet people out in the industry. CSIC is especially interesting as it is at the forefront of modern and innovative construction not only in Scotland but in UK in general. Just seeing the excitement in the eyes of the people working there when something comes together, must make anyone interested on being a part of the construction industry.

What have you learn so far in the construction phase working in CSIC? I had a very basic knowledge of the works it undertakes to build cross laminated panels or glue laminated panels, as such working on their construction allowed me to learn the process. I greatly value being able to explain every part of the construction phase of this project and CSIC has ensured we are fully engaged in the construction processes at their factory.

What are some challenges you are/were facing in the construction stage? Having to quickly learn the processes as well as all safety requirements needed at the factory was definitely a challenge. However, CSIC has offered comprehensive guidance and training for this to be overcome.

Overall working under tight timescale has also been a challenge with delays in delivery of material and construction taking longer than anticipated. Team ESTEEM is lucky enough to have a lot of well experienced members to quickly resolve any issues at hance.

What is your experience working with CLT? Prior to this project I had no experience of working with CLT. From working at CSIC factory I have been able to get my hands on the material and seeing how its made and used I now understand the benefits of CLT in construction.

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What are you thoughts about CLT in the future. CLT definitely have a role to play in the future of sustainable building design. Its presence in Scotland and the rest of the UK however depends on the improvements of the local timber infrastructure. Currently most CLT isn’t manufactured in UK and further investments in the technology would be required to make it more mainstream building material. Nevertheless, Team ESTEEM is doing its part in CLT promotion and will hopefully impact a part of this improvement.

A message for students creating similar projects like Team ESTEEM? This project has been a lot of hard work and volunteering hours, but I always saw that as an investment into myself and I can already see the vast improvement in my skill set compared to two years ago. The amount of work is then more of a motivation than a burden and I would encourage everyone to join any projects and volunteering experience that could potentially teach them something. Afterall, any job is a competition so employers will likely look for these experiences.

Anything you would like to add I am extremely proud of every member of the ESTEEM family. I have learned a lot from every one of those members and I can only hope they learned a little bit from me too. We overcame every problem that we have come across so far and we will continue to do so until the house is standing in Dubai.

Ayman Darve

What has been your experience so far in Team ESTEEM? From the very beginning of ESTEEM, now over 2 years ago, it has been a huge learning curve in the best way possible. However, what has also remained consistent is the sense of family & teamwork between the team despite our massive growth over time! The skills you learn are not only valuable in a working/professional environment but even life skills which develop you as a person hugely. For example; public speaking & delegation through being Vice Team Lead is a skill due to lack of confidence I never thought would come easy, but the narrative and environment of the Team made such challenges much smoother to develop & conquer. Couldn’t ask for a better team!

What are the most valuable aspects you are taking from this project to your professional career? The growth in software knowledge, to even having experienced liaising with sponsors and members ofthe professional industry are truly skills which make each member of the team & I valuable and applicable candidates for further endeavours. Time management, chairing meetings, organising presentations, professional documentation development for people inindustry are just a few of the huge list of hard & soft skills which will truly help me apply my best professional self in any given task. Esteem truly equips you with an almost starter kit

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Precision engineering matched with innovative construction techniques and homegrown timber is helping to break new ground

of transferrable skills in assortment to ensure your professional growth.

What is your role in the prototype phase and what do you do? In the prototype & Esteem team, my role has been; Vice Team Leader, and now after over a year will be transferring to Team Advisor. Throughout the past months the build up to the prototype has been getting more and more exciting. From organisingthe area of build with meetings alongside HeriotWatt Uni Staff members to even sponsors who will be largely involved in the upcoming procedures, for example; CSIC. The scheduling and organisation of key paperwork, materials, Gantt charts, communication lines which as student we do not normally get exposure to were some of the many tasks which I undertook in collaboration with other Esteem members to contribute in pushing and striving for the positive progression of the prototype build. I can confidently say, the rigour and hope for seeing our house finally come to life in Edinburgh is a highly anticipated sight for all of our team across the world.

Getting to participate in making it a reality is a bonus!

What are you thoughts about CLT in the future. The future of CLT I believe is just beginning, given the huge gap in the market

for such a lightweight, durable and flexibly applicable material, the progression and use is only sure to grow.

There are multiple opportunities of more research to ensure and certify it’s capabilities, however the sheer innovation of CLT proves future thinking and sustainable the Esteem house aspires to be. The material is a huge part of our build and Esteem is proud to be working alongside CSIC to make our customised panels, as they have been a huge help in pushing forward our sustainable & innovative ethos whilst they themselves continue to perform research on the material to further grow its capability and applicability in the construction industry.

A message for students creating similar projects like Team ESTEEM? The message or words of encouragement could genuinely be put to three words; Resilience, Teamwork & Innovation. From the beginning of our project our aspirations as a team were always to push boundaries and create a home which is representative and speaks to each & every member of our team. I feel proud & confident in saying each of our members have grown an unbreakable bond with a unique aspect of the house through the hard work we have all put in.Communication in such projects becomes very affluent and

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building a bond between members beyond “professional/ working boundaries” isstrongly what I believed pushed us working so cohesively (props to our Social Media/ Events Team)! If you want more advice in a new innovative way of how Esteem is; tune in to our podcasts which we have recently began in discussion with various members ofour Team, from different specialities, backgrounds & academics/professions!

Ellenor Witton

What has been your experience so far in Team ESTEEM? I have been a part of team ESTEEM for almost two years, since stepping into the role of Structural Team Leader. Earlier in the project, during the design stages it was less technical and more about finding a floor plan and aesthetic to the house that we liked. Since then, as more decisions were made and interest from companies peaked, we were able to design a structural system utilising different products. For example, we wanted to build a prototype on our Edinburgh campus and then dismantle before shipping the house to Dubai. This is now taking place and simplified with the use of the X-Rad system by Rothoblaas. Great for design for manufacture and assembly (DFMA) and disassembly in this case too. As this project has developed so has my own knowledge and skills, applying our curriculum and much more into this sustainable house we are now building.

What are the most valuable aspects you are taking from this project to your professional career? The most valuable aspects of this project for myself has been the opportunity to work on using mass timber, incorporating cross laminated timber (CLT) and glued laminated timber (glulam).

Sourcing homegrown timber to form these products and have that hands on experience making them ourselves at Construction Scotland Innovation Centre (CSIC) has been immeasurable; learning about the material in a practical way too. This project opened opportunities at University too, being the first student at Heriot-Watt to base their dissertation this topic of home-grown timber and in the form of CLT. I have established an area of construction that I enjoy, using sustainable materials and I hope to carry this forward within my structural engineering career.

What is your role in the prototype phase and what do you do? So far during the prototyping phase I have been based at CSIC. I have been involved in making the glulam ground beams and the CLT floor panels. I have also been involved in the postpressing processes for the wall panels: attaching the X-ones by Rothoblaas to the corners of each panel which will then be used to connect adjacent panels and used to lift them into place. The visual panels also require sanding to ensure a quality finish.

How do you feel working in CSIC? Working in CSIC has been fun and practical way to learn more about the materials URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

we are using in our house. It is a space driven by innovation and sustainability, always looking to better the construction industry. It is a great thing to be part of.

What are some challenges you are/were facing in the construction stage? The most significant challenge that we have been experiencing in the factory is probably the difficulty of attaching the X-one connections to the corner of the panels, which is something we have a lot of. Finding the best approach and tools to increase efficiency with this has taken a while but now the process is slightly easier.

What are you thoughts about CLT in the future. In my opinion mass timber, of which CLT is a form, is the future of construction. Timber is one of the only structural materials that could be considered renewable, with the speed of trees growth, especially softwoods which are those usually used within mass timber.

CLT can form all structural elements of a building, except underground foundations due to the implications of the moisture on the timber, and lighter than alternative materials such as concrete.

Countries such as Austria with established commercial CLT production utilise CLT within design much more than we do in the UK; but Austria alone also produce approximately two-thirds of the worlds CLT volume. CLT use in the UK is increasing but there is much more opportunity. We chose to showcase the Team ESTEEM house built out of UK-grown timber to show that further carbon reductions can be made.

A message for students creating similar projects like Team ESTEEM? Team ESTEEM Is an extra curricular project and therefore does not take priority over university work. It is hard to distinguish this line as we are learning while doing this project and actually gaining more hands on practical experience. But you do gain a lot of experience that is practical for our future careers

Jairis Alvarez

What has been your experience so far in Team ESTEEM? I have been working in the ESTEEM project for more than two years and it has been the most amazing experience I had during my university years.

I am studying Architectural Eng nevertheless in ESTEEM I am in charge of the Communications, PR, Marketing and Events. This project made me discover other passion which I will be always grateful. It is the truly example that what you study is not want you have to be. The project make me enhance my leadership, organization, communication, engineer and team work skills which some are not thought in university. It encourage to talk to PR media companies like radio, news, magazines and to talk in presentations and conference. It made me network and meet professional not

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Left - The Solariskit solar thermal collector can convert sunlight into hot water at temperatures of up to 50C Right - The prism shaped device minimises reliance on fossil fuels for heating

only from engeierin and construction but also journalist, writer and suitable consultants. It has broken the stereptype that ones you finish university you are able to talk to industry experts. Moreover, it has made me lead a group of talented students that are development their skills while contributing their knowledge in the project. I never thought I will gain so much experience during this project which has enhance my professional skills.

What are the most valuable aspects you are taking from this project to your professional career? There are so many valuable aspects that I am taking from this project, one of them was to have the opportunity to talk to industry experts and network with companies that value a sustainable future.

When I started university, it was hard to find something to be interested since I was new in the country. Finding team ESTEEM had made be out of my comfort zone because of the team leader role. I also learn that to be a leader you dont have to know everything because there is always a team, we all support each other to learn and grow professionally. Finally, I have discovered that I have a passion for communications as well as architactural eng. Therefore I hope to embrace to create a more sustainable future in which everyone is able to share the knowledge.

What is your role in the prototype phase and what do you do? My role in the prototype phase is different than others, due to the fact that I am not in Edinbugh at the moment. I am coordinating everything online with the help of my team. We also create internal and external events to covers topics from Team ESTEEM to CLT Future. I hope to be able to flight in Edinburgh at the end of July to be part of the assembly of the CLT panels and furniture design.

How do you feel working in CSIC? I had the opportunity before Covid-19 to meet staff members from CSIC, they are so passionate professional which are leasing the sustainable and timber industry. They have the energy and knowledge to share which encourage individuals to be innovative and find new solutions. As I mentioned I am also working with them virtually to organaize site visit, events and podcasts collaborations.

A message for students creating similar projects like Team ESTEEM? My message for anyone that is working or will have the opportunity to work in projects similar to Team ESTEEM is that never give up and take advantage of every single opportunity that comes in your way. Sometimes in life we follow a professional path because ‘We were told it was the best thing to do’ However that might not be your passion.

Projects like this one give you the opportunity to really know what you would like to do for a professional career because they encourage to be out of you comfort zone and to learn knew things. The world in full of opportunity to innovate and groth personally, you just have to explore and find the one that best suits you.

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SIR DAVID ADJAYE

D OWN TO EARTH RIBA GOLD MEDAL WINNER SIR DAVID ADJAYE IS ON A PLANET-WIDE MISSION TO ENABLE ARCHITECTURE TO REDISCOVER LOCAL CONTEXT, SOCIAL VALUE AND SUSTAINABILITY THROUGH A NOMADIC APPROACH THAT EMPHASISES LIVING OFF THE LAND IN A LITERAL SENSE. WE UNPACK ADJAYE’S WIN AND ASSESS WHAT IT MEANS FOR A PLANETARY PRACTICE.

Sir David Adjaye has joined the illustrious ranks of RIBA Gold Medal for Architecture winners, taking his place alongside the likes of Jack Coia, James Stirling and Louis Kahn for his outstanding contributions to architecture. Recognised for his roles as founder of Adjaye Associates and as a global ambassador for the profession, Adjaye transcends national borders and specific cultures through a common language of building.

Logging into the RIBA live stream from his native Ghana a visibly emotional Adjaye said: “Being a good architect is both being a constructor and an artist at the same time. You oscillate between two worlds. As a student, I was inspired by all these great names in architecture.

“Winning the RIBA bronze medal as a young student (1993) was a validation for my parents. I remember running to tell my mum! That medal unshackled me from the burden of having to prove this was the right track. It gave me freedom early and sparked the sense that I wanted to use architecture not just as a building art form but for the social change and social justice embedded in its DNA. “As a creative person in a profession where you have not seen yourself represented there’s always a nervousness around whether what you’re doing is correct and will be accepted. As somebody on the tip of a spear I’d want to do things but then URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

look over my shoulder to see if it was ok or if my client would accept it. Even after the bronze medal, that question was always there.

“The gold medal and the acknowledgement of my peers is unshackling me to deliver the vision that I’ve been working towards for the last 25 years of my career and be bold about it.

The freedom to creatively express yourself through the lens of the profession you choose means I can serve a social agenda but not feel I’m in any way restricted because of who I am and how I’m seen in the world.”

A global practice in every sense of the word Adjaye Associates has grown to span three continents from three separate offices, with no clearly defined ‘head office’ to stamp on a letterhead in deliberate ambiguity. “I decided early on that I didn’t want a single office that is located in one place. I prefer the approach of architects like Charles Moore or Frank Lloyd Wright who made their offices where the work was. I love the idea that when you make an office in the culture or continent where you want to work there’s osmosis which refines the work beyond the sensibilities that you acknowledge in your mind.

The teams become deeply embedded in those customs and cultures and that is a useful refining device for work.”

These ideas are coming to a head in Ghana where Adjaye is leading efforts to establish a West African architecture >

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© CHRIS SCHWAGGA

SIR DAVID ADJAYE

© JAMES TM TOWILL

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© LEONID FURMANSKY

Top - Specere is a stark timber structure at the summit of Deadwater Fell in Kielder Forest Bottom - Adjaye’s range takes him from remote mountaintops to the urban cliff face of the Sugar Hill mixed use development in New York

URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

© ASSEN EMILOV

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The Bernie Grant Art Centre in London demonstrates Adjaye’s ability to furnish communities with a more dignified environment

that builds on the specific history of the region, adapting it to meet the needs and standards of today. Adjaye said: “The opportunity is not for architects to do what we’ve always done and bring it over here. The continent has suffered so much of that. It’s ripe for an investigation of what the idea of architecture can be. It’s not just a project for architects of African descent, it’s a project for architecture to imagine the opportunity of culture and geography which is the foundation of the world.”

Leading by example Adjaye is pioneering the use of rammed or reinforced earth construction as a means of reducing reliance on concrete and the associated carbon dioxide emissions linked to the production of cement.

“Rammed earth is the vernacular for most of the continent and is ripe for rethinking. There’s pioneering work by my colleague Diébédo Francis Kéré in Burkina Faso but I’m interested in how to use this technology to make large scale buildings.

“At the Thabo Mbeki project in South Africa, we’re creating a monumental rammed earth structure for a presidential library, something previously unheard of. It is the most abundant material on the planet and the most important for its ability to return to its original state. It has profound biophilic properties, it kills germs and insulates and I’m obsessed with it.

“What’s exciting about the continent is that there are more

than green shoots. There are systemic opportunities that will lift the continent in the next 25-30 years. It’s already started.”

In the West Adjaye’s attentions are focused on finding an identity within architecture from which to create a dignified environment for communities, ably demonstrated by the practice’s work at the Stephen Lawrence Centre and Bernie Grant Centre in London. In the US this approach finds a grander outlet with the African American Museum of Black History and Culture, a totemic project for Adjaye who welcomed the opportunity to delve into some of the critical issues affecting the African American community and its relation to America, Africa and the world. “That allowed me to think critically about the ways diverse communities operate in different contexts,” observed Adjaye.

Although involved in these local endeavours Adjaye does not lose sight of the big picture, unafraid to couch his work in expansive terms. “It creates a body of work which is planetary, not global, it’s about a specificity of geography and culture concerned with resolving needs. It also allows a body of work to have a different authorial voice, not just the language of architecture and its range but the ability of architecture to continually learn and investigate sustainability, ecology and social pressures.

“Sustainability is the backbone of geography and culture. >

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URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM © ALAN KARCHMER

© ALAN KARCHMER

Culture as social sustainability and geography as ecological sustainability. The backbone of any piece of great architecture is the ability to work between geography and culture to create unique works with limited resources.

Adjaye paid moving tribute to the art teacher who set him on the path to becoming an architect. “The first prompt as a young teenager was my art school teacher who said I was creatively very capable but I didn’t pay any attention to it. I was too obsessed with science and maths. This incredible teacher said was the first to suggest I should pay attention to this side of myself.”

Conscious of the need to inspire a new generation Adjaye had this to say to those seeking to follow in his footsteps: “Every opportunity can teach you things that will become the archive of your future. That means every opportunity is a moment of excitement for what that can do for you in the present and the future.”

“For me, the gold medal is traditionally something for an old man or woman. As an architect, we say your mid-fifties are when you’re a young teenager so I like to think I’m a teenager who is just getting going!

The 2021 Royal Gold Medal selection committee was chaired by RIBA President Alan Jones and included architects Lesley Lokko, Dorte Mandrup and 2020’s Royal Gold Medal recipient Shelley McNamara and structural engineer professor Hanif Kara.

Left - The Smithsonian National Museum of African American Arts and Culture is described as a bronze statement in a city of marble Above - A fountain rains calming waters, offering a serene oasis for visitors fresh from heart rending exhibitions below

© LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

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Barack Obama Former US President Barack Obama led tributes for Adjaye in a recorded message from across the Atlantic, lauding his ability to harness the power of architecture to speak directly to diverse communities.

“In many ways, David and I are kindred spirits, we’re both about the same age although he was smart enough to shave his head so he doesn’t have as many grey hairs! We both had childhoods moving all over the place. I grew up in Hawaii and Indonesia, David’s father was a diplomat so his family moved around Africa and the world before settling in London.

“Growing up in different places doesn’t make you a good architect, if it did I’d be able to do more than just doodle. But it does give you a perspective that others might not have and an understanding of different cultures and an appreciation of different conditions. An ability to put all those things together in new ways and see the world in all its unique, indescribable beauty.

“Over the years David has used that perspective to create spaces unlike any the world has ever seen.

I’ll never forget watching the Smithsonian Museum of African American History & Culture rising near the White House. That bold bronze statement in a city of marble. Imagine having a chance to step inside and feel how this Ghanaian-British architect helped tell a uniquely American story. It was genius, pure and simple.”

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PAPER TRAIL MARK CHALMERS

Z I NE SCENE THE DIGITAL REVOLUTION HAS HIT PUBLISHING HARDER THAN MOST BUT IN A SECTOR EVOLVING BY THE DAY GRASSROOTS JOURNALISM CONTINUES TO THRIVE IN PRINT. WE ROUND UP THE BEST ARCHITECTURE ZINES FROM GLASPAPER TO MATZINE, CRUMBLE AND -ISM TO PROVE THAT WHEN IT COMES TO GETTING YOUR MESSAGE ACROSS WOOD PULP IS STILL IN A CLASS OF ITS OWN. I fell in love with zines when I was a teenager, when the possibilities were infinite…

The story of zines begins with the music fanzines which blossomed either side of 1980, when fans began to publish their response to New Wave music. Among the first were “Punk”, produced by John Holmstrom in New York, “Sniffin’ Glue” edited by Mark Perry in London, and soon afterwards “Pastelism”, put together by Stephen Pastel in Glasgow.

As a teenage music fan fifteen years later, “Sun Zoom Spark” was a fanzine I could actually buy. It was published in Galashiels during the early 1990’s and soon morphed into a professionally-published magazine. A couple of years later Sun Zoom Spark folded, but the collaborators went on to form indie rock band, Dawn of the Replicants.

Later I followed the breadcrumb trail of zines to explore graffiti, freight hopping and urban exploration. I came across “Section 61” zine and “Not Guilty” mag – both with fresh takes on the urban environment. Section 61 delved into derelict buildings and underground spaces, while Not Guilty captured the work of graffiti writers on mass transit systems.

Yet the zine isn’t a new form. Robbie Burns was a zinester, and his poems were originally circulated in the literature of ordinary folk, the chapbook. Printed crudely onto cheap paper and illustrated with raw woodcuts, chapbooks were anonymous pamphlets containing tales and ballads. Like Tam o’ Shanter’s “snowfall in the river”, zines are ephemeral – yet just like Burns’ chapbooks, they leave > URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

A selection of seductive covers from Section 61 & Not Guilty illustrate prints allure

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PAPER TRAIL

EDITORIAL

4 URBAN CABARET

September 2001 glaspaper

TRAVEL TASKS

PHOTO REPORTER

Political, cultural and historic mechanisms shape our built environment and everyday lives. GLAS travelled by train from Estonia to Slovenia to investigate the social and economic conditions shaping these countries and to explore alternative ways to experience place and history.

TREASURE HUNT

GLAS used the tasks to observe, follow, encounter and record each city; its urban structures, infrastructures, social relations and rituals. It is hoped that these might be used as a template for students, teachers and individuals to construct similar critical journeys.

A

B

C

D

E

Tallinn (D1) to Riga (D2)

The purpose of Treasure Hunt is to discover and establish spaces and places known by locals. A key factory or office should be visited within each city. Locals working within these workplaces should be followed or asked to describe their journey from work to their home, nearest café, train station, launderette etc. The equipment required is a sketchbook and pen. These should be used to document a mental map of directions given, to record conversations that took place, to sketch the experience of spaces visited. The use of city maps is strictly forbidden. Bits of ‘treasure’ should be collected along the way (newspapers, matchbooks, launderette tokens, flowers from park).

Vilnius (E3) to Warsaw (C5)

1 2 3 Warsaw (C5) to Prague (A6)

The outcome of the Photo Reporter task has been compiled into a large fold-out poster to form a Polaroid matrix of places and activities: the architecture of the everyday.

Information gathered during the remaning tasks (Treasure Hunt, Get on the Bus, Passport Control) has been presented as a series of critical writings and graphics to encompass pertinent issues affecting the countries visited.

GET ON THE BUS

On the Edge presents shifting European boundaries in their wider historical context. The new eastern European ‘Edge’ has been reviewed from Moscow. Readily accessible European state capitals are shown to be wide open for capitalist invasion. The recent concentration of wealth has been limited to tourist trails, business districts, UNESCO heritage centres and huge, out of town shopping malls.

GLAS believes this to be a step in the wrong direction.

The purpose of Photo Reporter is to build a concise visual journey through the everyday. The equipment required is a Polaroid camera, maps and labels. Only twenty photos can be taken in each city. These photos should relate to a set of predefined subjects.

Example subjects: Football, Motorways, Public Housing, Private Housing, Spaces of Labour, Swimming pools, Prostitution, Play areas, Hospitals, Panorama, Allotments, Café, Bus queues, Markets, Kiosks, and Nightlife. Labels can be used to make notes to describe not just the ‘what’ but ‘why’ each photo has been taken. Maps are required to locate where the places/people/objects have been photographed.

Riga (D2) to Vilnius (E3)

GLAS devised four specific tasks to explore each city and gain impressions within a short time frame. These tasks established alternative criteria for looking at places and challenged the ‘official’ histories and cultures that are relentlessly represented on conventional tourist trails.

The erosion of existing public services and the decline in locally controlled commerce are an inevitable progression.

THE JOURNEY Glasgow to Tallinn (D1)

GLASpaper 09 On the Edge was conceived in May 2004 when ten new member states joined the European Union (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Slovenia, Malta, Cyprus). Like Scotland, these countries exist on the geographic periphery of the EU. On the Edge records certain aspects of GLAS’s critical journey through 8 of these 10 new member states.

PASSPORT CONTROL

Get on the Bus requires that a bus, tram, train, bike or boat be taken to the end of the line of a non-tourist related route. The purpose of this task is to form a subjective account of a journey through a particular part of the city. The equipment required is a sketchbook and pen within which to narrate the journey. The use of photographs is strictly forbidden. The journey should be documented as a stream of consciousness rather than a full piece of text. This could be a loose collection of thoughts relating to views, smells, people, places and sounds.

The purpose of Border control is to investigate and record facts about fellow travellers. The equipment required is a set of flyers, a camera and an adjustable date stamp. The flyers should be distributed within the train carriage or bus in which you are travelling. Attempt to collect at least two ‘cards’ per train journey.

Example facts could be: name, age, date of birth, destination, duration of stay, reason for journey. These should be set in a passport style flyer, with a front page that gives a brief explanation of your project.

As an icebreaker to starting conversation share some tea and biscuits.

4 5 6

Prague (A6) to Bratislava (B7)

7 8

Bratislava (B7) to Budapest (C7)

Budapest (C7) to Ljubljana (A8)

GLAS would like to thank the following people for their support before, during and after On the Edge: Levente Polyak in Budapest (www.kek.org.hu), Architect Karine Kreja in Warsaw, Ondrej Chrobak of Display Gallery in Prague, Ivan Stanic and Maja Simoneti in Ljubljana (www. trajekt.org). Barbara Golicnik from Glasgow School of Art for helpful pre-trip advice.

Thanks go to Mr Kossak for the donation of polaroid film and to John Davies for the travellers’ notebooks and pens. Special thanks go to Jan Timmermann and Holger Schwarz for their dedication and enthusiasm during the trip. GLAS would also like to extend a large thank you to the Lighthouse and the Innovation Fund for their continued support.

TRAVEL KIT

GLASpaper is no longer available via mailed subscription. GLAS contact details, copies of all GLAS publications can be found and downloaded at the GLAS web-site: www.glas-collective.com Published by Glasgow Letters on Architecture and Space (GLAS) Copyright © GLAS. All material in glaspaper may be reproduced in full with the prior consent of GLAS.

polaroid camera

map pack

task information

ISBN 978-0-9554623-0-6

notebook and pen

record box

city maps

D1 Estonia Capital Tallinn Geographic coordinates 59 00 N, 26 00 E Area total 45,226 sq km Land 43,211 sq km, water 2,015 sq km Land boundaries total 633 km (Latvia 339km, Russia 294km) Coastline 3,794 km Population 1,341,664 (July 2004 est.)

Population growth rate -0.66% (2004 est.)

Population Density 30.000 people per sq km Tallinn Population 400,378 Labour force 654,000 (2003 est.)

Labour force by occupation - agriculture 11%, industry 20%, services 69% (1999 est.)

Unemployment Rate 10.1 % (2003) Tourism 950,000.00 visitors each year

E3 Lithuania Capital Vilnius Geographic coordinates 56 00 N, 24 00 E Area total 65,200 sq km Land NA sq km, water, NA sq km Land boundaries total, 1,273 km (Belarus 502 km, Latvia 453 km, Poland 91 km, Russia (Kaliningrad) 227 km) Coastline 99 km Population 3,607,899 (July 2004 est.)

Population growth rate -0.33% (2004 est.)

Population Density 55.000 people per sq km Vilnius Population 542,287 Labour force 1.642 million (2003 est.)

Labour force by occupation - agriculture 20%, industry 30%, services 50% (1997 est.)

Unemployment Rate 10.3% (2003 est.)

Tourism 1,422,000.00 visitors each year

A6 Czech Republic Capital Prague Geographic coordinates 49 45 N, 15 30 E Area total 78,866 sq km Land 77,276 sq km, water 1,590 sq km Land boundaries total 1,881 km (Austria 362 km, Germany 646 km, Poland 658 km, Slovakia 215 km) Coastline 0 km (landlocked) Population 10,246,178 (July 2004 est.)

Population growth rate -0.05% (2004 est.)

Population Density 130.00 people per sq km Prague Population 1,165,581 Labour force 5.25 million (2003 est.)

Labour force by occupation - agriculture 5%, industry 35%, services 60% (2001 est.)

Unemployment rate: 9.9% (2003) Tourism 5,610,000.00 visitors each year

C7 Hungary Capital Budapest Geographic coordinates 47 00 N, 20 00 E Area total 93,030 sq km Land 92,340 sq km, water 690 sq km Land boundaries total 2,171 km (Austria 366 km, Croatia 329 km, Romania 443 km, Serbia and Montenegro 151 km, Slovakia 677 km, Slovenia 102 km, Ukraine 103 km) Coastline 0 km (landlocked) Population 10,032,375 (July 2004 est.)

Population growth rate -0.25% (2004 est.)

Population Density 108.00 people per sq km Budapest Population 1,775,203 Labour force 4.164 million (2003) Labour force by occupation - agriculture 8%, industry 27%, services 65% (1996) Unemployment rate 5.9% (2003 est.)

Tourism 14,402,000.00 visitors each year

D2 Latvia Capital Riga Geographic coordinates 57 00 N, 25 00 E Area total 64,589 sq km Land 63,589 sq km, water 1,000 sq km Land boundaries total 1,150 km (Belarus 141 km, Estonia 339 km, Lithuania 453 km, Russia 217 km) Coastline 531 km Population 2,306,306 (July 2004 est.)

Population growth rate -0.71% (2004 est.)

Population Density 36.000 people per sq km Riga Population 747,157 Labour force 1.18 million (2003 est.)

Labour force by occupation - agriculture 15%, industry 25%, services 60% (2000 est.)

Unemployment rate 8.6% (2003 est.)

Tourism 490,000.00 visitors each year

C5 Poland Capital Warsaw Geographic coordinates 52 00 N, 20 00 E Area total 312,685 sq km land 304,465 sq km, water 8,220 sq km Land boundaries total 2,788 km (Belarus 407 km, Czech Republic 658 km, Germany 456 km, Lithuania 91 km, Russia (Kaliningrad Oblast) 206 km, Slovakia 444 km, Ukraine 526 km) Coastline 491 km Population 38,626,349 (July 2004 est.)

Population growth rate 0.02% (2004 est.)

Population Density 124.000 people per sq km Warsaw Population 1,671,670 Labour force 16.42 million (2003 est.)

Labour force by occupation - agriculture 27.5%, industry 22.1%, services 50.4% (1999) Unemployment Rate 20 % (2003) Tourism 17,950,000.00 visitors each year

B7 Slovakia Capital Bratislava Geographic coordinates 48 40 N, 19 30 E Area total 48,845 sq km Land 48,800 sq km, water 45 sq km Land boundaries total 1,524 km (Austria 91 km, Czech Republic 215 km, Hungary 677 km, Poland 444 km, Ukraine 97 km) Coastline 0 km (landlocked) Population 5,423,567 (July 2004 est.)

Population growth rate 0.14% (2004 est.)

Population Density 110.00 people per sq km Bratislava Population 428,672 Labour force 2.58 million (2003) Labour force by occupation - agriculture 8.9%, industry 29.3%, construction 8%, transport and communication 8.2%, services 45.6% (1994) Unemployment rate 15.2% (2003 est.)

Tourism 975,000.00 visitors each year

A8 Slovenia Capital Ljubljana Geographic coordinates 46 07 N, 14 49 E Area total 20,273 sq km Land 20,151 sq km, water 122 sq km Land boundaries total 1,334 km (Austria 330 km, Croatia 670 km, Italy 232 km, Hungary 102 km) Coastline 46.6 km Population 2,011,473 (July 2004 est.)

Population growth rate -0.01% (2004 est.)

Population Density 99.000 people per sq km Ljubljana Population 258,873 Labour force 875,000 (2003) Labour force by occupation - agriculture NA, industry NA, services NA Unemployment Rate 11.2% (2003 est.)

Tourism 884,000.00 visitors each year

ON HERITAGE The accession of eight Middle- and Eastern European states in May 2004 drew their respective national capitals to our ‘western’ attention. While cities like Budapest and Prague, and to a lesser extent Warsaw, have sat in our consciousness for quite some time, we have yet to “discover” cities like Tallinn, Riga, Vilnius in the Baltic or Bratislava and Ljubljana. They all form places that now attract international capital or in which companies like the car manufacturer Volkswagen relocate their production. They are increasingly seen as opportunities for multi-national investment and construction companies, as well as a new operational field for big architectural firms in the “Old Europe”. Most of all they are developed and marketed as new tourist destinations.

While these eight capitals have many differences they also have many similarities.

Each city displays economic, social, and spatial disparities between the so-called historic cores and the surrounding city of the 19th and 20th century. This is of course nothing new and is prevalent in most European cities. However, what makes this contrast in these cases even more poignant is that their historic cores are – with the exceptions of Bratislava and Ljubljana – all inscribed as UNESCO world heritage sites.

Yet it is significant that those areas, which are designated as protected world heritage sites, make up only a tiny proportion of the actual city surface of Tallinn, Riga, Vilnius, Warsaw, Prague, or Budapest. In Tallinn andVilnius these are the medieval or baroque, partly walled town centres. In Riga it is the combination of Hanseatic old town and the Art Nouveau quarters of the early nineteenth century city extensions. In Prague and Budapest this includes the ensembles of city quarters from the 17th to the 19th century and imposing castles on both sides of the rivers Vlatva and Danube. Warsaw’s completely reconstructed old town was almost entirely destroyed during the Second World War. Indeed, all of these ensembles have their architectural merit and are of historical interest.

Nevertheless, for the visitor who is willing to look beyond these designated heritage zones, the question whether this protection through the UNESCO world heritage status is of actual benefit for the development of those cities in their entirety will inevitably come to mind. One might ask how more desirable and necessary developments beyond those boundaries are subsequently prevented from happening. The concentration around a core that is considered as being worthy of attention may lead to a negligence and degradation of the areas that surround it.

The areas that are designated as sites of cultural world heritage receive a disproportionately high level of communal, national and international funds for the restoration of their historic building stock,. regardless of whether the whole city population profits from these measures.

This inevitably fosters the unequal social and spatial treatment of core and periphery.

There is a further gentrification process through costly restoration and conservation measures that force existing residents and traditional businesses to leave as they cannot afford rising rents and property prices. Their place is taken by emerging wealthier social classes and most of all by an armada of international fashion shops, cafes, restaurants

CONVENTION CONCERNING THE PROTECTION OF THE WORLD SOCIO-SPATIAL HERITAGE GLASGOW LETTERS ON ARCHITECTURE AND SPACE meeting in Tallinn, Riga, Vilnius, Warsaw, Bratislava, Ljubljana, Moscow and Glasgow from the 12th September to the 26th September 2004, at its ninth session.

We note that our rich and diverse socio-spatial heritage is increasingly threatened with destruction that although a traditional feature of capitalist development is a process that globalisation and neoliberal economic policies has aggravated and greatly accelerated.

We consider that the deterioration or disappearance of the complex social and spatial heritage fought for in the history of various political and environmental struggles constitutes a harmful impoverishment of the social history of all peoples and classes.

We think that the protection of this heritage at the national level often remains incomplete because of the scale of international forces that are threatening it and of the insufficient economic, cultural and moral considerations of the country where the heritage to be protected is situated.

We consider that all international conventions, recommendations and resolutions concerning social and spatial achievements should demonstrate the importance of safe guarding these universal achievements for all the peoples of the world, regardless of their race, class or national identity.

We consider that the ‘ignored’ elements of the socio-spatial history of everyday life is of outstanding interest and therefore needs to be preserved as a part of the world heritage of humankind as a whole.

We think that in view of the magnitude and gravity of the persistent dangers threatening them, it is incumbent on the global community as a whole to participate in the protection of the above sociospatial heritage, at the very least by striving to regulate the activities of international capital and property developers.

We consider that it is essential for this purpose to adopt new provisions in the form of a convention to establish an effective system of protection of the complexity and diversity of our socio-spatial heritage, organised on a permanent basis and in accordance with contemporary means and methods.

We have decided at our sixteenth session, that this question should be made the subject of an international programme that rethinks the role of heritage and the values considered important in our respective urban histories.

We adopt this on the twenty-sixth day of September 2004 at this convention.

and hotels predominantly geared towards growing tourism. Designated as UNESCO world heritage, these city centres – and this applies to a similar extent to Bratislava and Ljubljana – develop new targets within the ever-growing tourism industry. By cleansing the presented architectural and city history from any aspects that are not marketable the old towns are frozen in a hyper-historical condition. They become – as in the cases of Tallinn, Warsaw, or Prague – historical theme park attractions for international tourists.

But what lies beyond these UNESCO cores? The foreign visitor runs the risk of romanticising conditions and experiences.

Poverty might be mistaken for a simple way of life. Nevertheless, behind the officially propagated image of all these capital cities one can observe numerous social and spatial aspects and achievements. One must ask if it should be these that are to be protected against uncontrolled economical, social and spatial changes.

A well developed public transport affordable for all social groups; markets where, in contrast to mushrooming out-of town supermarkets, local produce is on offer; places of informal trading which form an important addition to the small income of pensioners or small farmers; a residential housing provision that

Above - GLASpaper employ sketches, montages and tongue in cheek advertisements to convey hard-hitting messages Right - Mmm Magazine adopted a more colourful style for its brief run, slapping your eyeballs with vivid comicstrip art

something lasting behind.

This article is a brief survey of independent architectural publishing in Scotland over the past couple of decades: the pamphlet architecture, D.I.Y. press and zines whose occasional issues come out according to their own inner dynamic. Five of the six titles here – Crumble, Gargoyle, GLASpaper, -Ism, Matzine – sprang from architecture schools, while Mmm magazine was in several respects a one-off.

The first architecture zine I came across was GLASpaper, and uniquely it was the outlet for a design co-operative, rather than an end in itself. It’s the most politically-conscious of the zines, and as Adrian Stewart told me, “It’s very refreshing to hear GLAS referred to again, especially as many of the issues we were responding to are even more valid now than ever.”

G.L.A.S. was a collective of architecture students, teachers and designers based in Glasgow which came together in 2000. As Jonathan Charley explained, “G.L.A.S grew out of a design studio that I ran for ten years at Strathclyde. Together with ex-students we decided to organise an architect’s co-operative with a mission to provide a radical critique of the capitalist built environment.”

URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

G.L.A.S. produced nine thematic issues of GLASpaper.

The first appeared in 2001 and a second quickly followed, protesting against the M74 extension. By issue seven the team had travelled from Glasgow to Berlin, and the ninth and final issue appeared in Winter 2004. As it happens, it was printed as a broadsheet – just as the original chapbooks were.

Mmm Magazine was conceived and edited by Rory Olcayto, and like the early issues of GLASpaper, it was supported by The Lighthouse. “Man made memories Helensburgh” appeared in 2003; unlike the others here, it lasted for only one issue. Its bold drawings and vivid colours were strongly influenced by comicstrip art, and it borrowed the format of a graphic novel to relate ideas about architecture and urbanism.

After several zine-less years, Matzine arrived in 2009, and became the longest running of the titles. I chatted to Rowan Mackinnon-Pryde who explained, “We began the zine as a group in our final year in Architecture at Dundee. When we graduated, and everyone was dispersed and working in practice, it was decided that each issue would be edited by a different member of the team … whilst at times that might be problematic, in fact it’s quite liberating.”

is not entirely geared towards the privately owned market for wealthier social groups; a dense infrastructure of public playgrounds and social facilities; the absence of security paranoia and constant video surveillance which we are so used to in Britain.

These are just a few examples of the social, economic, spatial and cultural achievements that will be lost in the process of “harmonisation” according to EU standards. Preserving them should be the real purpose of a UNESCO world heritage programme.

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‘The nation is .... scarcely more than a fiction projected by the bourgeoisie onto its own historical conditions and origins ... as a way of masking class contradictions and seducing the working class into a illusory national solidarity’ Henri Lefebre - The Production of Space, 1974

Lines on a map are apparently drawn arbitrarily. Over time they shift and deflect, revealing that their positioning on the page reflects not the physical features of natural geography but political motives. These are capricious lines which distribute space according to the exigencies of a certain moment – a political bargain, the wilfulness of a leader, the location of an ethnic group or a precious natural resource. No line on a map, however, is ever drawn arbitrarily. It only seems so because the motives under which it is shaped are invisible to the naked eye. Invisible but infinitely powerful. The lines of the map tend not to accept ambiguity or even history. Instead, they impose new relationships on to the landscape. The past is full of examples: the estate maps of eighteenth-century England which spoke of the desirability of appending common land to the landlord’s holdings; the lines of the Down Survey in Ireland which dissolved the traditional indigenous relationship to land and replaced it with new English property rights; the 19th century maps of Africa which posited a landscape bereft of culture, a blank canvas on to which colonial powers were invited to inscribe their identities; the maps of the Third Reich which showed the location of ethnic German minorities in such a way as to suggest their inclusion into an expanding Greater Germany was both inevitable and natural; the line which divided India and Pakistan in 1946 that caused the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people and irrevocably altered an Islamic culture which had inhabited India for more than a thousand years. And so on.

The nation state is born from such lines cast abstractly on to a page, its borders shaped according to the same caprices. But once drawn, its culture must be made to fit the lines of geography. States which in the past may have enjoyed only a fleeting, ephemeral existence are re-made, given a history that speaks of longevity, of legitimacy, of a culture that is unique, rarefied and distinct from the influences of elsewhere. National heroes are resurrected as are the types of architecture, food and music and other cultural phenomenon which are designated to be ‘typical’ of the nation. Under tourism this process intensifies as the State’s uniqueness becomes its greatest selling point.

eclipsed from everyday memory. Some vestiges, however, are human. The Russian ethnic minorities of the present day Baltic states find themselves practically stateless.

Re-located here under the economic plans of the Soviet Union, since its break-up and retrenchment they have found themselves on the wrong side of a national boundary.

Unable to work in certain jobs and denied other benefits of citizenship unless they learn the official state languages of Estonian, Latvian or Lithuanian, they are compelled to pay for the Soviet Union’s past aggressions and expansionist policies. It is tempting to say that the places where they live in the city reflect this. In the vast concrete estates of the urban fringes you will often find the majority of signs are written in Cyrillic script and a predominance of Russian speaking voices. These are places the tourist seldom sees. This architecture of mass, social housing, of flat roofs, reinforced concrete and deck-access speaks of internationalism and other, discredited ideologies. A stark counterpoint to the spires, fachwerk and pitched roofs of old Tallinn, Riga or Vilnius, it is regarded with the same suspicion as its Russian inhabitants.

But curiously, it is the quaint and picturesque old town centres which, while ostensibly celebrating the indigenous and local, most rigorously pursue the international. Here, to provide comfort to western visitors one will find the icons of luxury and familiarity: Italian coffee, French delicacies, German hospitality, Irish beer and of course, words plucked from English to convey to the tourist, the ‘character’ of the place. In the world of commodities the ideology of the nation-state is infinitely flexible.

Forbidden Fruit - Moscow as Casino City

The site of the curiously demolished Hotel Moskva

Marx still standing in front of the Bolshoi

‘Revolution’ acquires a new meaning

Memorial to the student killed in the 1991 coup

The Dom Narkomfin, 1926, on its last legs

Lunchtime - Day one - Week 80 - It is an unexpected high pressure shirt sleeve day Incongruous at this time of year but the weather is haywire in Russia as well - Eager for familiar tastes The world in sealed mouthfuls has arrived - “Sir, would you like Dim Sum, Gyozzas or Tortellini ? - I stick to Pelmeni, hollow Russian dumplings stuffed with meat or fish generously drenched in butter or smetana Twenty years have passed since I first stepped foot in Moscow. Like many before me I developed a blind spot as I walked through the city for the first time. It was impossible to remain unmoved by the statues of Lenin and Marx and by the list of revolutionary heroes chiselled into walls. Equally impressive were the hammers, sickles and red stars that decorated the city in a superficially refreshing departure from the advertising detritus of western capitalism. This was the way ideology worked, using text or stone to camouflage state repression. As a politically naïve twenty five year old I was aware of the mantra “neither Washington nor Moscow”, but desperately wanted to believe that something had survived from the ten years that shook the world between 1917 and 1927. Armed with revolutionary memorabilia I returned from that first trip via Kiev, Sofia, Bucharest, Budapest and Prague. Determined to return east as fast as possible, I started learning Russian and immersed myself in the work of the political and architectural avant-garde of the 1920s.

The relationship between political change and urban development grew into an obsession and took me back to Moscow many times. Four political regimes later I am not at the age yet to write memoirs, but I suddenly felt older as I reminisced in the Hotel Rossiya devouring blinis stuffed with smoked fish.

When it first opened in 1967 its three thousand bugged rooms made it the largest hotel in the world and certainly for its time the most ambitious electronic surveillance operation. Peppered vodka clinked between us as we laughed at the fairyland panorama of Red Square and the Kremlin. We agreed that Russia would never be let it into the new Euro club. It is simply too exotic and unpredictable for fragile western European sensitivities, too prone to what imperial apologists call “Asiatic despotism”. Besides which it is geographically absurd for Europe to stretch to the Sea of Japan.

Evening rush hour - Bandits and businessmen storm the highways - Car ride with a rich friend who knew how to play the market - Marinated garlic and gushing buffets of food not seen outside of the Kremlin [except in Paris] for a hundred years We left the convoy of black bulletproof four by fours and drew up in the tarmac forecourt of one of Putin’s favourite restaurants. A cabin of Tsarist nostalgia it sits discretely at a junction in the forest to the west of Moscow. Obedient servants in peasant outfits proffering trays of sumptuous duck and fish have replaced surly state employees ladling kasha in Soviet canteens. Pickled grasses nibble away at platinum grade vodka. The bill would have been two months average wage if there was such a thing as an ‘average’, that is ‘middle’ class. “Djonatanchick, vi znaete, u nas net srednovo klassa,” only rich and poor. It was strangely warm that night.Warm enough to sit in a silver birch forest toasting relatives and friends whose names we could hardly remember.

The chandeliers and security lights of the homes of the siloviki and new bogatiye flickered through the rhythmically arranged trees. Like the nouveau riche everywhere they are paranoid, kitsch and in love with spying. Who cares if the mansion looks like a Palladian villa or an outsize dacha built out of marble. After seventy years of enforced discretion the display of privilege and largesse has been hungrily embraced. It might be enveloped in gangster chic and turbo blonds but it is ostentatious in the extreme. Part of what it means to be Russian is doing nothing in half measures. Drink vodka in 100ml shots, construct cathedrals with domes that swirl to heaven in a myriad colours sparkling with gold.

Plan boulevards to land planes on. Reverse the flow of rivers. Arrest people en masse and ensure that all productivity records are broken. Nothing is too much for Russia. But it is too much for Brussels man.

Day Two - Good morning Gospodin Maxim Gorky -Burnt vodka stomach- Ten different things made from milk for breakfast - Triple espresso in a sixties gay retro bar - A few shivers but recovery is foreseeable - Not for Gorky - He’s gone - Dostoevsky sits in front of the Bilblioteka Lenina - But that’s a good thing compared with Peter Pan on the river A quick 360-degree pirouette at the bottom of Gorky Street [I will not call it by its ‘new’ pre-revolutionary name Tverskaya] is enough to understand.To the South overshadowing Revolution Square, giant advertising hoardings hide the hole where the Party Hotel “Moskva” once stood. It was mysteriously demolished on the orders of Major Luzhkov’s engineer despite the fact that three generations of Soviet citizens had shuffled past its monumental stone façade. Opposite, buried under glass domes that drain Moscow’s energy supplies sits the elite shopping centre on Maneshnaya Ploshad.

To the north, banners and signs for Samsung, Italian Breakfasts, VIP Slot Machines, New Collections, Universal Invest, and “revolutsia”www.ctc-tv.com,

1925 Tallinn is the Estonia, Riga is in Latvia, Vilnius is in Lithuania, Warsaw is in Poland, Prague is in Czechoslovakia, Bratislava is in Czechoslovakia, Budapest is in Hungary, Ljubljana is in Yugoslavia, Malta is in the British Empire, Cyprus is in the British Empire.

1950 Tallinn is the Soviet Union, Riga is the Soviet Union, Vilnius is the Soviet Union, Warsaw is in Poland, Prague is in Czechoslovakia, Bratislava is in Czechoslovakia, Budapest is in Hungary, Ljubljana is in Yugoslavia, Malta is in the British Empire, Cyprus is in the British Empire.

2004 Tallinn is the Estonia, Riga is the Latvia, Vilnius is the Lithuania, Warsaw is in Poland, Prague is in the Czech Republic, Bratislava is in Slovakia, Budapest is in Hungary, Ljubljana is in Slovenia, Malta is Maltese.

Cyprus is 63% Greek and 37% Turkish.

In countries whose existence is owed to the break-up of a colonial power, the identity of their former rulers – most explicitly statues and monuments – is most systematically removed or suppressed.Vestiges of foreign, alien cultures are purged from the history books, chiselled off public buildings and

is a selection of letters written from Moscow in 2004 reflecting upon some of the changes that have taken place in the city over the last decade, transformations that mirror many of the changes taking place ‘on the edge’ of the new Europe, the former edge of the Soviet sphere of influence in Eastern Europe.

1914 Tallinn is the Russian Empire, Riga is in the Russian Empire, Vilnius is in the Russian Empire, Warsaw is in the Russian Empire, Prague is in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Bratislava is in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Budapest is in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Ljubljana is in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Malta is in the British Empire, Cyprus is in the British Empire.

1942 Tallinn is the Reichskommissariat Ostland (Germany), Riga is the Reichskommissariat Ostland (Germany), Vilnius is the Reichskommissariat Ostland (Germany), Warsaw is under the General Government (Germany), Prague is in Germany, Bratislava is in Slovakia, Budapest is in Hungary, Ljubljana is in Italy, Malta is in the British Empire, Cyprus is in the British Empire.

It also inevitably requires omissions.

Thus, historic Prague is described as a Czech city rather than what it was: a city of the Austro-Hungarian empire whose cultural flowering owed everything to its heterogeneous population and its position as an intersection of Czech, German and Jewish cultures. Similarly, in Warsaw where one will struggle to find the remnants of a five hundred year old Jewish culture or even the location of the largest Jewish ghetto of the Second World War, while being confronted on almost every street corner with commemorations of the ethnic Polish uprising against the Nazis of 1944. In Vilnius – before the Second World War, known as the Jerusalem of the north – the Museum of Genocide pointedly fails to mention the fate of Lithuanian Jews and concentrates instead on the horrific experiences of ethnic Lithuanians at the hands of Soviet Russia.

POSTCARDS FROM AFAR

1799 Tallinn is the Russian Empire, Riga is in the Russian Empire, Vilnius is in the Kingdom of Poland, Warsaw is in the Kingdom of Hungary, Prague is in Austria, Bratislava is in the Kingdom of Hungary, Budapest is in the Kingdom of Hungary, Ljubljana is in Austria, Malta is French, Cyprus is in the Ottoman Empire.

63% of Cyprus and 100% of all the rest are in the European Union.

dominate the runway-sized boulevard. After decades of commodity deprivation the city centre embraced the retail revolution with the same zeal that was formerly reserved for organised state spectacles. It is now a predictable soup of historical theme park and consumer outlets with all of the coffee bars and business lunches that you would expect in a twenty first century global city. Needless to say, when it came to embracing legalised private property, Russia did so with gigantic open arms.

On the foundations of a powerful state capitalist system, 1930s Chicago was spliced with laissez faire nineteenth century Britain, a heavy dose of Yakuza, and stirred.The kind of ‘gibkiye, bezumni capitalism’ that was unleashed transformed Moscow into a kleptomaniacs paradise, a ‘feudo-capitalist’ cocktail of epic proportions and unknown taste. Bewildered citizens began to spin out of control like demented wind up toys. It was pitiful to see the Professor of Historical Materialism selling flowers outside the metro to make ends meet. Welcome to the new Russia. Look but do not taste the party snacks.They are reserved for paying customers only. Continuity is everything despite the fact that historical amnesia is the leitmotif of the early twenty first century. The roads still part like the Red Sea when the sirens of authority bleep down the streets. But everything else is fragile. Licences guaranteeing press and media freedoms are revoked as soon as they are granted, just as the lightweight packaging of the consumer boom is as easily peeled off the remains of the Soviet State as it was stuck on.

Late Morning - Mushroom pies in the ‘bistro’ chain - A Baltic cold front - The weather has shaken off the Indian Summer- Time for a treat on the metro - Good to see it hasn’t been vandalised - Head for Kievskaya via my favourite Mayakovskaya There is something unspeakably sad and forlorn at the park of Victory on the western fringes of the city. Its sombre demeanour is compounded at this time of year by the first chill winds of winter blowing in bursts between the fragments of low sunshine.

Dedicated to the millions of Russians who died in the Second World War and to the ‘victory of the Red Army’, it is a giant semi-circular colonnade constructed from cold granite, concrete, and stone. Faced with white marble tiles it surrounds a monumental obelisk and small church. Nestled in the gaps between the columns polished green cannons point skywards. In the woods at the back stand a lonely Jewish memorial and an equally lonely mosque. Couples are getting married and hold on fiercely to hemlines and bouquets. Cross-country skiers practise their moves on giant elongated roller skates. I headed down the triumphal promenade towards the hoardings and lights of Kutozovski Prospect thinking that a funereal walk punctuated by shiny guns and gods seemed an inappropriate way of remembering such slaughter. Once mass murder enters into double figures it is already unspeakable. When it hits seven figures it becomes too abstract for mortal comprehension and symbolic monuments. The Second World War and the internal system of discipline and punishment had scarred the history of every family that I had ever met. I read the names of cities liberated by the Red Army in 1945, cities that had already been annexed by Napoleonic, Austro Hungarian, Tsarist and Nazi troops and who were quickly to find themselves incorporated into the gulag. The grainy black and white footage of Soviet tanks entering Budapest and Prague replays itself, as do the revelations of the show trials and labour camps.

I remind myself to stop reading tales of human misery. At the entrance to the tube a man who was either Chechen or Georgian was being stopped and searched, an unfortunately common sight in the city. Moods are saturated with ruined buildings and twisted bodies. People are tense, suspicious and jumpy after the summertime attacks. Desperate for explanations for the wave of atrocities many have grasped at dangerously simplistic explanations rooted in conspiracy theory, paranoia and racism.

Others wallow in nostalgic images of Saints and Stalin. Beslan is too much for anyone to talk about, but it has undoubtedly reinforced the fear of ‘other’ people. There are still a few Africans in town despite the petty harassment and the racist attack on the Patrice Lumumba student hostel.

Some of the once large population of ‘international comrades’ stayed after the ‘end’ of the liberation struggles, a few married Russian girls, and alongside the ubiquitous Chilean flute band there is now a sprinkling of African and Brasilian footballers. But there is barely concealed hostility towards anyone who looks remotely Arab, Chechen, or Uzbek.

The city centre, public transport system, and shopping malls are virtually Muslim free. Of course many of them still live in the city. But they have merged into the periphery, close to the bazaars and markets that they have run for a thousand years.

Early Afternoon - Black bread and fried chicken on Novinsky Bulvar- I always liked the smell of benzene - In sight of the plaque commemorating the student killed by a tank in the 1991 uprising - Off to pay homage to the Constructivists again

There it is, in worse shape than ever. Alert. The modern masterpiece the Dom Narkomfin built in 1926, the prototype incubator of a “new way of life” faces erasure.

There are two reasons. The first is because there are only a few individuals who care enough about the ideas of the Soviet avant-garde to want to preserve the memory of a “housing commune of a transitional kind”.

The second is that it sits on a prime piece of real estate next to the American Embassy. “Why do you take so many photographs of that crumbling wreck?” Asked a war veteran sitting on the broken bench in the remains of the children’s park. “Well believe it or not Sir, despite the render falling off the brick work and the reinforcing steel bursting through the concrete frame I consider this ruin to be one of the most important buildings of the twentieth century.” I climb up the wall at the foot of the neighbouring wedding cake to say farewell. In front of me a wine tasting ceremony is being arranged in the entrance to a glass office block - the architectural signature of global capital. Back out into Novinsky and along the old Kalinin Prospect. Cut down to the Arbat and through the open-air matrioshka market. Giant billboards sell “Ekolegend Kottedges” with the fraudulent hookline of “freedom, happiness and security” emblazoned across an image of a smiling middle class Russian family. For the more prosperous, elite incarceration is on offer in one of the new retro-Stalinist “penthaus” towers, whilst the superrich retire to eclectic fortified star houses in close proximity to nature so as to remind themselves of their humanity. Enough for one day Late Night TV - Pomegranate Juice - More Pomegranate Juice - I remember Paradjanov’s “Zvet Granatov” Chat shows - Beslan - Putin’s latest autocratic moves Smoke from roadside fireworks make passers by jump -10.30 -1970s Nostalgia Film - Life, love and politics on The Collective Farm - It makes life look so peaceful and simple Can you imagine a book being published in this day and age with the title - “Town Planning Culture in European Socialist Countries.”? I think about this extraordinary concept as the film lulls me into ideological delusion with its surreal portrayal of daily life as a pastoral idyll. The next programme - a drama about hostages, Chechen terrorists and exploding bodies, rudely interrupts this dream of another world.

Saturday - Crisp autumn golden light paints a misty skin on the city - Time for some revolutionary tourism to set my head straight - New types of teenagers born when it all collapsed are confident in their consumption They left the statue of Marx in front of the Bolshoi. Not because of the carved slogan “proletarians of the world unite”, but because tourists need memorabilia, and the lion headed orator is a great photo opportunity. All the older certainties have gone. The whole of Moscow seems to be galloping with a beer in the hand. Hot piroshki, a shot, and an espresso under the gaze of Pushkin are a welcome change from the austerity of food queues and prohibition. I read an article in the paper about the descendents of pre-revolutionary aristocrats trying to reclaim their estates. I get angry as they moan with acute memory loss about how unfairly their families were treated by the revolutionary tribunals during the civil war. Any one would think their Great Grandparents ran their former lands and factories, as benevolent charity workers. Out of curiosity I decided to visit the museum of the revolution, which an elderly red track suited woman reminded me was on the corner. “Ah yes of course, just up there on the left the old maroon pastel coloured building. But it’s not called that any more, no, now it’s the museum of recent history.” The City authorities had called time on time itself. Capitalist boomtowns do not possess such embarrassing relics. Now it’s a dead and buried clutter of dimly lit timber and glass cases surrounded by fading turquoise walls. The same grandmothers that had welcomed heroes in former days supervise it. Now they are there to usher visitors to the souvenir shop. None of it ever really happened you know.

Saturday Night - Day Five - A visit to an old friend - An architect turned landscape painter - Piati-etashni concrete panel housing - Fond times of carpets - The smell of oil paint - Dill, tomatoes, agurtzi, belomorkanal, glasses please At the end of the metro line in a station like Ulitsa Podbelskovo urban life is a brutal parody of the privatised historical theme park in the city centre.

Out on the periphery there are few tourists. There are no sharp suits and shoes, no sign of the middle class, rather a chaotic bazaar of kiosks selling toxic vodka and Korean Lacoste shirts. Awash with alcoholic poverty the doors to the flats have new metal covers. Kids hang around on threadbare roadside verges jacking up with a shared needle in full view of passing prams. Adrift and resentful there is a whole generation reared on the idea of cradle to grave state support and employment that have no place in the neo-liberal economic project embraced with passion by the siloviki. They remember all too well the experience of a slowly disintegrating economy and the periodic “deficits” of consumer goods and food. Now they face deprivation again. They look with astonishment at the twenty-year transformation of Moscow from a dusty citadel of extraordinary political and military might into a kaleidoscope of adverts and shops. It seems somewhat banal to point out that many of the new emporia seem bereft of proletarians, in the same way that it is predictable that the flip side of Moscow’s transformation into a show case for all that global capitalism has to offer has been deepening social inequality. It is autumn now. Russia always explodes in autumn. If not in this one then in the next.

ON THE EDGE FROM TALLINN TO LJUBLJANA

glaspaper critical writings on architecture and space

09

Matzine treads the fine line between serious ideas and intellectual playfulness, which helps to give it the characteristic personality which is sometimes lacking in titles which have a revolving editorship. When I asked whether Matzine was part of a wider movement, Rowan noted that, “We were aware of ‘zine culture’ but the invitation to be part of Archizines perhaps brought to our attention the wider movement of informal architectural publications.” Archizines was a touring exhibition and later a book produced by Elias Redstone which captured the zine scene a decade ago.

While some titles are uncomfortable with being called a zine, Rowan was quite emphatic: “Matzine is definitely a zine,” and she went on, “To try to define what the content of a zine should or could be, probably misses the point!

Matzine stretched the format of the magazine to include debate and voice. The events and debates became an important and intrinsic exploration of each theme, and brought us together as editors.”

I wondered how zines fitted into the wider Scottish architecture scene? “Zines and commercial magazines serve different purposes and can co-exist quite comfortably. The freedom that the zine structure/ lack of structure offers can lead to some really creative outputs, however the fact that these projects are often self-funded can prove to be limiting.”

Costs aside, the physical format still offers lots of value. >

A heady concoction of videogames, comic books and Helensburgh mmm shone brightly for a brief moment

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PAPER TRAIL

69

Ada Jušic `

B

alkan soviet architecture always strived to make the mundane grand and heroic, from public art to towerblocks, whether it was appropriate or not.

Most people find it hideous but I’ve always had a soft spot for it, where I was born in Sarajevo we could see the ali-pashine polje housing estates from our flat, they were built in parallel phases with the buildings in different heights so there was a layered effect, parts of some phases visible behind the others, I think they were supposed to give the impression of a mountain range or rolling hills. It’s more like crooked teeth when the sun hits it right you can see what they were aiming for under the crumbling facades and peeling paint.

15

Matzine made a splash surfacing the unconventional strains of beauty to be found in Balkan architecture

“As a group, I think it’s true to say that all the editors of Matzine share a love for the printed artefact and we are interested in how a physical publication is constructed.”

After a run of thirteen issues plus a special, Matzine went on hiatus in 2014 although Rowan explained, “The zine isn’t currently active, but all the editors are still in touch, and it’s not dead, just hibernating!”

2017 was a productive year, with another two titles emerging: Crumble and Gargoyle. Crumble sprang from Edinburgh School of Architecture and its first issue begins, “This is not a magazine about architecture,” which previous editor Holly Baker reinforced: “It’s an architecture magazine that isn’t an architecture magazine”.

I spoke to current editor Felix Wilson and asked him to explain the paradox. “We aren’t a glossy ‘architecture magazine’ but I would argue we are more formal than a zine, yet more intermediate and anti-dramatic than a ‘traditional’ magazine. By creating an architecture magazine that isn’t an architecture magazine, I think we are able question and focus on what exactly the discipline is about, what it can entail and what is even relevant to ask.”

True to that manifesto, the writing is accessible and the articles are pithy – but the most striking aspect of Crumble

is its design and repro. The Risograph machine has become identified with zines, just as the xerox machine was in the 1980’s, and Riso printing offers the potential to work with spot colours as a screen printer would. It also has an endearingly wonky character which Burns’s chapmen would recognise.

Felix explained, “We chose Risograph partly because of the striking visual aesthetic, partly because of the scale of production and partly because of what is on our doorstep.

We have a lovely relationship with Out of the Blueprint, our printers from the start.” Felix agreed with Rowan at Matzine that printed matter still has a place in 2021: “Physical media has more pleasure, joy and excitement to it.”

Since the editorial baton has passed from Crumble’s founding editor Theo Shack to the next generation of students, I asked Felix what the advantages are of having a revolving editorial team. “In many ways Crumble is an untested Prototype form of practice as we are forced to change leadership every couple years and our contributions to architectural culture extend beyond our physical magazine.”

Also part of the Class of 2017 is Gargoyle, which offers a whimsical take on the city: photos and drawings >

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PAPER TRAIL

Left - A Spartan approach at Gargoyle left the content to do the talking Right - Crumble magazine positions itself in philosophical tones as ‘an architecture magazine that isn’t an architecture magazine’

interspersed with lyrics and reflection. At 16 pages of A6, which expanded to A5 size in the most recent issue, Gargoyle is modest. When I spoke to co-editor Liam Cooke, he explained, “Gargoyle has always been a small publication – initially the equivalent of a single sheet of A3 paper. We only had two guest contributors per issue and the rest of the content we produced ourselves; there is no large revolving team behind it!”

The editors met at the Mackintosh School of Architecture, although “When we launched Gargoyle in 2017, we weren’t aware of a contemporary movement of zine culture in architecture. We had publications like Archigram and the original MacMag in mind … but it was only later that we started to meet other zinemakers who were engaging in architectural discourse, and now it is easy to see Gargoyle as part of a wider ‘archizine’ movement in Scotland.”

Liam continued, “I attended an Architecture Fringe event a few years ago which involved a discussion with several speakers from various levels of architectural publishing – from small zines to established magazines – and while each viewpoint differed, some content to be included in the discussion, others calling for disruption and critique, the resulting conversation was fascinating and one I hadn’t heard URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

before.”

“For us, with Gargoyle we try and open up the discussion on architecture to a wider audience, to appeal to the reader who wouldn’t pick up an architecture magazine and read a review, but might buy a poetry collection or visit a photography exhibition.” As with Crumble, Gargoyle aims to reach out beyond architects and architecture students; but like Matzine, Gargoyle is currently taking a break after a run of eight issues.

-Ism Magazine is the most recent of the six titles, approaching its brief with a theoretically-inclined curiosity and publishing some stylish and acute writing. -Ism also neatly closes the zine circle. When I spoke to Aoife Nolan, she explained, “We were exposed to GLASpaper while at university, having been taught by Jonathan Charley who was a member of their editorial team.”

-Ism started out in 2019 at Strathclyde and three issues have been published so far. Aoife explained, “Overall, the magazine is evolving in parallel with our team’s experiences, which has provided us with a prism based on the different stages of an aspiring architect’s career, initially as students and currently as young professionals working full-time.”

I wondered whether the editorial team saw -Ism as

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6 Ville-Pekka exploring the skateboarding bowl through movement.

xiv.

7 Dalia rotating at the side of the skateboarding bowl at Iso-Vilonen.

DMS VPS

5 Inside the skateboarding bowl at Iso-Vilunen.

2 The Shuffling Machine: a concrete skateboarding bowl located in Iso-Vilunen, a former gravel pick-up site between Iidesjärvi and Kaukajärvi, both lakes in Tampere.

3 Modernist tower and concrete grandstand at Kaukajärvi lake.

4 The modernist viewing tower and concrete grandstand at Kaukajärvi lake undergoing renovation.

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-ism

-Ism is the most recent title to emerge, building on the acculmulated knowledge of those who went before while serving as a standard bearer for a broader movement

part of a wider movement? “Yes, we do feel there is something happening in Scotland with magazines, zines and publications in relation to architecture. We can’t pinpoint it, but hope it’s going to keep growing.” Aoife continued, “We are not trying to challenge established titles per se., but would like to challenge established themes or norms that are ingrained in our thinking … Some of the other magazines do this too, but we like to celebrate this attitude of fearlessness.”

Aoife ended by suggesting, “The current movement of publications in Scotland carries a tone of, ‘Hello, we are here just trying to figure things out’ because we’ve learned, as a younger generation that not being open about this statement has caused disastrous problems in the profession.”

That spirit of exploration shows that there’s more to architecture writing than news items, building reviews and PR pieces. As Joan Didion said, “I write entirely to find out what I’m thinking, what I’m looking at, what I see and what it means.” Zines are a vehicle for discovery, if not a rival to commercially-published magazines like Urban Realm which report, record and occasionally rant.

Yet the two cultures aren’t mutually exclusive; some of the Matzine team have written for Blueprint, while Rory

Olcayto went on to become the editor of Architects Journal.

But there’s also a counter-story to the rise of zines – which is the decline of print magazines. The AJ gets thinner each year, Building Design went digital, and Arca magazine, which was a competitor to Urban Realm’s predecessor, closed after a few issues.

Nonetheless, print is still important. As the zine makers emphasised, part of the joy of zines is in making a physical thing. Aoife Nolan admitted, “We try not to fetishise printed matter, but let’s face it — we do!” and perhaps that sums up the essence of the archizine.

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SCOTTISH DESIGN AWARDS

D I V I NE DES I GN THE JUDGING IS DONE AND THE NOMINATIONS ARE IN FOR THE SCOTTISH DESIGN AWARDS 2021 REVEALING A LOCKDOWN-PROOF SELECTION OF THE BEST NEW PROJECTS TO GRACE US WITH THEIR PRESENCE. FROM A SHIPSHAPE CHURCH TO A BARNSTORMING LUMBER MILL THERE IS SOMETHING TO EXCITE EVERY TASTE AHEAD OF THE AWARD PRESENTATION THIS 15 JULY.

The Scottish Design Awards have published a bumper number of finalists for 2021, reflective of a robust architecture and design community thriving in difficult circumstances.

Twin judging panels faced the unenviable task of whittling down hundreds of entries to a chosen few during two intensive remote judging sessions with panellists praising the high calibre of presented work.

Recalling a notably collegiate decision-making process, design panel chair Hiten Bhatt, head of design at RAPP, said: “What I loved most was walking away with a new respect for the design industry in Scotland. As a judge, we can sometimes have a very London-centric view of creative work. And that needs to change. So it was brilliant to see equally impactful and outstanding work coming from our neighbours in Scotland.

“I’ve always been blown away by the level of craft –

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packaging in particular. This year, it was the turn of the motion and experiential entries. Not only were they beautifully put together, but there was a clear and striking concept at the heart of the work.”

The architecture panel was headed by prof Alan Dunlop who was similarly struck by the high standard of work. He said: “A very pleasant day spent chairing the Scottish Design Awards with informed, insightful colleagues. We reviewed a number of extraordinary projects, reaffirming that the standard of architecture and design across all project types by Scottish architects is very high indeed and in a few cases exceptional.”

The Scottish Design Awards 2021 results will be brought to you via a free broadcast event on 15 July. Tune in with your friends, peers and clients on the night for an evening of celebration.

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© GILBERT MCCARRACHER

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Previous page - The Floating Church by Denizen Works is a unique mobile congregation space Above - Fraser Avenue by 7N Architects heralds the rebirth of an unfit for purpose housing estates Below - Ayr Grammar by BDP challenges perceptions of what a school should be

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SCOTTISH DESIGN AWARDS

© DAPPLE PHOTOGRAPHY

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© ANDREW LEE

Above - Lockerbie Sawmill by Konishi Gaffney sells timber before you’ve set foot inside Below - The Larick Centre by Collective Architecture marries utility and joy

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This Bearsden home by McGinlay Bell illustrates well the delights of suburban living

SCOTTISH DESIGN AWARDS

© ROSS CAMPBELL

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Left - Northburgh Street by KennedyTwaddle was commissioned by a modular contractor Right - St Matthew’s Parish Church by Page/Park

SCOTTISH DESIGN AWARDS

© GILLIAN HAYES

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Above - St Andrew’s Drive by jmarchitects employs ‘urban villas’ to deliver affordable accommodation Below - Commercial Quay by Morgan McDonnell offers ‘edgy’ serviced office space for on-trend Leith tenants

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© ROSS CAMPBELL

Above - Rutherglen is home to this pair of Keppie designed office pavilions commissioned by Clyde Gateway Below - At Dublin Street Lane, Edinburgh, DS Architecture have inserted two contemporary mews homes in a historic setting

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Upper Parkbrae by Brown & Brown makes the most of its meadow setting in Aberdeenshire © NIGEL RIGDEN

SCOTTISH DESIGN AWARDS

© DAVID BARBOUR

© KEITH HUNTER

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© KEITH HUNTER

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Top Left - Glenkinchie Distillery by Michael Laird Architects saw a B-listed Victorian building refurbished as ‘The Barden Distillery’ Top Right - Inverness Justice Centre by Reiach & Hall provides the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Services facilitates fully integrated court proceedings Bottom Left - Royal Hospital for Children and Young people by HLM draws numerous NHS departments together on one site for economies of scale Bottom Right - Walter Bower House by Atkins reimagines the site of an old paper mill as an integral part of the University of St Andrews

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TAMSIE THOMSON JOHN GLENDAY

ARCH I T ECTURE AMBAS SAD O R URBAN REALM CATCHES UP WITH NEWLY INSTALLED RIAS CHIEF EXECUTIVE TAMSIE THOMSON TO FIND OUT WHAT THE CLIMATE CRISIS AND POST PANDEMIC FUTURE MEAN FOR A PROFESSION READY AND WILLING TO PROVIDE SOLUTIONS. SETTING HER SIGHTS ON THE GLOBAL STAGE THOMSON IS EVANGELICAL ABOUT BUILDING SCOTTISH ARCHITECTURE AS AN INTERNATIONAL BRAND AT THE FOREFRONT OF RECOVERY AND RENEWAL.

The appointment of Tamsie Thomson as chief executive of the Royal Incorporation of Architects in Scotland promises to usher in a new programme of change. Led by president Christina Gaiger this is designed to shape the response of the RIAS to the climate emergency and our post-pandemic future while expanding architecture’s sphere of influence.

Since being appointed director of the London Festival of Architecture in 2016 Thomson has steered that organisation to become the world’s largest architecture festival, bringing architects and architecture to the attention of new audiences, a feat which Thomson will now attempt to replicate north of the border. Hailed as someone with a proven track record in breaking down barriers between people, disciplines and competing interests Thomson is also credited with giving New London Architecture (NLA) an indispensable voice in reshaping the alpha city by uniting architects, the public, politicians and business leaders.

An honorary fellow of the RIBA Thomson has also worked for Shelter and the Civic Trust and has taught architecture at the University of Brighton, providing a suitably distanced background from which to view Scottish architecture from a fresh perspective.

Speaking to Urban Realm in the aftermath of her URBAN REALM SUMMER 2021 URBANREALM.COM

appointment Thomson explained what drew her to the role saying: “It’s a role I’ve always had on my horizon. I’ve always been involved in architecture in one way or another. It’s the obvious next step and an enormous opportunity to expand engagement with the wider public and to support architects and clients. There’s so much that can be done in terms of making sure the legislation and systems are there as well as encouraging training and professional development opportunities.”

Thomson is also mindful of the potential to rebrand the RIAS, casting aside a reputation for formality in favour of a more open and inclusive stance that is much more approachable than the scandal-hit institution of old. “The stars are aligning for a really exciting period in architecture and design,” states Thomson. “There’s a recognition that it’s a sleeping giant and there’s not been much push to explore the value of that to the economy both in terms of architecture, social equity and climate issues. Scotland has an opportunity to play a lead role.”

Thomson cites the appointment of Gaiger last year as the youngest ever RIAS president as symbolic of the changes now afoot at Rutland Square where a newfound appetite for change is now apparent. “Everything I’ve seen indicates an exciting time for the organisation and an alignment with the things I would like the RIAS in particular and architectural organisations in general >

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to do,” observes Thomson.

Coming from four generations of Scots who had to leave because they couldn’t find work Thomson is acutely conscious of the need to recalibrate our cities and towns to cater for their residents at a time when the brain drain to London looks to be switching into reverse. Articulating how the post-pandemic economy aligns with this need Thomson says: “How we look at infrastructure is going to be very different. The idea of an hour and a half commute in and out of an office is probably not as attractive now you’ve gone cold turkey. The idea of living in town and walking kids to school is a massive improvement in your quality of life and cities like Edinburgh offer that. You’ve got a density of cultural attractions and clean air, unlike sprawling London.”

Crucially, Thomson is cut from the same cloth as Gaiger and both are pulling in the same direction to realise the same ambitions. Setting out her agenda for the first six months Gaiger says: “For me, the first six months is going to be a lot of learning and meeting people and understanding the issues around diversity, emerging architects and legislation. I’ll also be doing more with the public. I believe that if you have a message to convey about architecture you mustn’t try and get people to come to you, you must go out to them. A lot of what I’ve done in my previous roles at the NLA and the Festival of Architecture is taking architecture to the people using shop window presentations, commissioning emerging architects to do summer benches across the city to projects like the Dulwich Pavilion.” (a temporary events space by IF_DO within the grounds of Dulwich Picture Gallery that was commissioned with LFA.) Engaging with a multitude of constituencies to spread RIAS messaging will draw upon all of Thomson’s expertise and experience, given the often incompatible demands of the public, commercial interests, and government agencies. “It echoes the role of the architect”, observes Thomson. “To a certain extent, an architect is only as good as their client and the relationship they have with each other. You’ve got to create great architecture within a financial framework with a commercial outcome working within a legislative context which states what you can and can’t do. You have to negotiate those constraints to produce good architecture and when it goes wrong it’s normally because it’s failed to connect properly with one of those partners.”

This disconnect is all too evident from a look through any planning portal where the idealism of architects is often at loggerheads with commercial expediency. “Or valueengineered out”. That awful term”, interjects Thomson. “You see so much that goes into planning which is then contracted into something of less architectural quality. We need to challenge some of the accepted norms around procurement. There are lots of ways it can be open and accessible and still deliver good results on time and within budget. It’s about breaking down some of those fears and opening up the opportunity to people in different ways.”

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A bulging in-tray is dominated by more than procurement and design standards however with the pandemic and Brexit still taking their toll, do these competing crises point to a genuine inflexion point in the way we work? “I read somewhere that we overestimate immediate change and underestimate long term change during crises”, says Thomson. “To me, the pandemic is interesting in how small changes can lead to more radical change. People have got used to home working and business has continued. For architecture and associated professions, the order books are still pretty full. Very few practices seem to have gone to the wall. Aside from issues around schooling, working from home and not being part of a team it has been positive for people. If we all commute 50% less than we did, what does that mean for carbon emissions and infrastructure plans and how

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Thomson cites the Dulwich Pavilion as an example of how architecture can be brought to the public

we construct our homes? What services do we need to build in villages and smaller towns? You can see how the domino effect of that change can be quite radical. In Scotland, you can see the potential of the Central Belt to dissipate populations as people move out to more rural areas for more space.”

Are these changes serving to raise architects and architecture higher up the policy agenda? With many of the medium to long-term consequences of the pandemic related directly or indirectly to the work of architects and landscape architects, can the clamour for space, light and flexible living seed a rediscovery of quality architecture among the public?

“I think you’re right”, responds Thomson. “I keep thinking of the high-density developer flats where the living space is open plan to the kitchen and what those spaces must have been like

for home working. There are no acoustic barriers or physical separation. If there are two of you in there, you’re in trouble.

“Local High Streets are packed with people who are using their local neighbourhood spaces more, what does that mean for public realm and pedestrianisation?”

In relocating from a city of 9m to a country of 5m many of these issues of wellbeing and quality of life ought to be more tractable. Well placed to lead the profession from July onward Thomson arrives at a pivotal moment. Thomson concludes: “Scotland has the skills base to be a really interesting engineering and manufacturing hub. There is so much potential for the RIAS and Scottish architecture in building an international brand because the opportunities are there. We just need to shout about it more.”

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CANDLERIGGS SQUARE

Left - The city block will be carved up between complementary uses Right - Candleriggs Square issoon to transition from no-go to all systems go

BLOCKBUST ER AT LONG LAST A PROMINENT GLASGOW CITY CENTRE GAP SITE IS FINALLY TO BE KNIT BACK INTO THE FABRIC OF THE CITY BUT WHAT TOLL HAS DECADES OF DERELICTION TAKEN? PHOTOGRAPHER JULIE BROADFOOT CAPTURES THE DYING DAYS OF THIS MOST STUBBORN OF GAP-SITES, CAPTURING FOR POSTERITY SCENES WHICH ARE ON THE CUSP OF PROFOUND CHANGE.

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As Drum Property Group commence preparatory works for a 500-bedroom hotel, the first element of the long-awaited £300m Candleriggs Square development in Glasgow’s Merchant City Urban Realm looks back at the history of a troubled site that has defeated the best efforts of a long list of architects and developers for the better part of twenty years.

Construction brings a happy conclusion to a saga that has seen one of the most prime pieces of real estate in the city languish unoccupied since 2002.

Designed by Stallan-Brand with Halliday Fraser Munro as the delivery architect, the phase one building is to be owned and operated by The Student Hotel (TSH), specialists in a hybrid hospitality model that also provides spaces for co-living and coworking as well as conference rooms and a fitness centre.

Subsequent phases of construction at the 3.6-acre development will include 346 apartments for the build to rent market which are expected to break ground later in the year.

Candleriggs Square is being delivered as a joint venture with Stamford Property Investments.

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Dec 2004

June 2010

Sept 2014

Selfridges scraps these plans with no planning application ever submitted.

Plans further evolve for a temporary car park and landscaping.

Richard Murphy Architects showcase a mixeduse vision.

Dec 2002

July 2009

June 2014

March 2015

Selfridges purchase the Trongate site for a £90m department store with BDP and Toyo Ito tipped to deliver

Selfridges publish draft plans by Ash Design for a popup public space on the mothballed site.

The site is acquired by mace and Mercer Real Estate.

The planning process and slow demolition progress delay work to ‘autumn 2016’.

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Jan 2017

Mar 2019

May 2020

May 2021

CDA is brought on board as delivery architect.

Drum Property Group become the latest owners of the city centre site.

Planning consent awarded for the hotel component of the plan.

Contractors are finally given the go-ahead for a summer start.

Nov 2017

Sept 2019

Sept 2020

Amended designs call for Candleriggs Square to be made car-free.

Stallan-Brand Architects showcase their initial ‘citadel’ masterplan.

Legal & General provide £81.5m in funding for 346 BTR apartments.

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A MAGAZINE ABOUT THE STREETS IS ON THE STREETS To advertise contact John Hughes on 0141 356 5333 or email jhughes@urbanrealm.com

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TO ADVERTISE YOUR PRODUCT OR COMPANY IN THIS SECTION CONTACT JOHN HUGHES ON 0141 356 5333 KINGSPAN TARGETS NET ZERO CARBON MANUFACTURING BY 2030

GREEN LIGHT FOR KNIGHT PROPERTY GROUP’S LANGLANDS COMMERCIAL PARK

Kingspan has published its inaugural “Planet Passionate” Sustainability Report, reviewing the first year of progress in the 10-year strategy it launched in December 2019.Kingspan has also committed by 2030 to reduce the carbon intensity of its primary raw materials by 50%. This will reduce the embodied carbon in Kingspan’s products and further enhance the significant carbon savings that Kingspan products already deliver.

Knight Property Group has been granted planning consent by South Lanarkshire Council for further development at Langlands Commercial Park in East Kilbride.

Knight will transform a 2-acre selfcontained site close to the existing Phase One development to create a brand new 23,980 sq ft industrial warehouse facility, which has the potential to cater for a variety of different businesses.

Web: www.kingspan.com

Tel: 01224 208820 Email: howard.crawshaw@knightpg.co.uk Web: www.knightpropertygroup.co.uk

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PEEL NRE LEAD PIONEERING WASTE PLASTIC TO HYDROGEN FACILITY Peel NRE, part of Peel L&P, is planning to develop its second waste plastic to hydrogen facility at Rothesay Dock on the north bank of the River Clyde, West Dunbartonshire. The £20m facility will take non-recyclable plastics to create clean hydrogen fuel for buses, cars and HGVs, with plans for a linked hydrogen refuelling station on the site.

Tel: 01506 433 173 Email: info@nordan.co.uk

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BLACK BEAUTY PORCELAIN IS A FEAST FOR THE SENSES

EDINBURGH-BASED TEAGUE IN THE GREEN LEAGUE

RAK Ceramics has launched Black Beauty, a new porcelain surface that brings an air of sophistication and luxury. Scratch and stain resistant and very easy to clean, Black Beauty lends any setting a timeless charm.

Combining the elegance of marble with the practical advantages of porcelain, the surface can be used as a striking wall covering or worktop.

Teague Homes is set to be a “green technology” leader after bringing forward 96 homes on Salamander Place, phase 6 of the company’s highly-successful Ropeworks scheme, totalling 667 homes. The company’s Buildings Energy Strategy Is aiming for a net zero carbon development with an aggregate reduction in carbon dioxide emissions of 42.55% compared to a baseline building under current regulations.

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TO ADVERTISE IN URBAN REALM PLEASE CONTACT JOHN HUGHES ON 0141 356 5333 OR EMAIL JHUGHES@URBANREALM.COM