In Search of the Authenticity of Molding and Casting

UCL Bartlett School of Architecture -Master of Architecture & Historic Urban Environment -Issues in Historic Urban Environment -BARC0063

Veronique Wei Huang Student number: 19128443

cover image from the Author

In research of the authenticity of molding and casting Study of Aria Building at 168 Upper Street by Groupwork

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT I wish to express my sincere gratitude to Dr. Eva Branscome whose kind supervision given to me throughout the course which shaped the present work as its show. Without her excellent narrative in the classes, I would not be inspired to think critically and compose this essay.

Further on, I want to thank my group mates whom I have worked together in the presentation on this subject.

I confirm that the work presented in this essay is my own. Where information has been derived from other sources, I confirm that this has been indicated in the essay.

Veronique Wei Huang 22/01/2020

1. Introduction The essay was initiated to study the Aria building at NO.168 Upper Street of Islington. The interesting symbiosis of the building and its representation triggered the curiosity towards the medium which is molding and casting in this context. I decided to focus on the subject of the medium, to explore its factual properties and the potentials in the vocabulary of the historical environment.

Scrape & Anti-Scrape To start the discussion in this paper, I would like to lay the two fundamental philosophies in the context of historical conservation, Scrape and Anti-scrape, at two different ends of the spectrum.

Eugène Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc, the architect who was in charge of the renovation of Notre Dame of Paris in 19th century believed to restore a building is not to preserve it, to repair, or rebuild it; it is to reinstate it in a condition of completeness which could never have existed at any given time. 1 This theory was counter proposed by William Morris and his Society for the Protection of Ancient Building in Britain which was called Anti-Scrape by the public. Naturally, the idea of Viollet-le-Duc became its opposite: Scrape. John Ruskin, the famed culture critic at his time was regarded as one of the earliest voices to justify the idea of Anti-Scrape in his books even before William Morris. He argued that historical buildings were like “corpses” 2 could never be recalled, his theory somehow reconciled with the “Emptiness” of Lao Tzu 3, they both respected the natural deterioration of things, let nature take its course.

1 Eugène Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc, the Dictionnaire raisonné de l’architecture française du XIe

au XVIe siècle (1854-1868). English edition On Restoration (London, 1875), pp. 9-17, 20-22, 27-28, 35-50, 62-65, 67-69, 71.

2 John Ruskin, The Seven Lamps of Architecture (London: Smith, Elder, and Co., 1849 ) p. 162-182 3 Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching (6TH Century BC)

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In the modern world, the Anti-scrape seems has been encouraged to be the mainstream concept through a series of conservation literature like the Vienna Memorandum of 2005, 2013 edition of Burra Charter. No matter the idealism of Viollet-le-Duc or the romantic ruins of Ruskin’s, there is more than one answer to the discipline for the preservation works, for instance, our case study Aria Building on NO.168 Upper Street.

Aria Building

Figure 1 Aria Building, looking South from Upper Street

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Figure 2 Upper Street Facades

Figure 3 Two anchor tenant buildings

Located along the important Upper Street of Islington links Angel and Highbury fields, the project on NO.168 commissioned by the local design and furniture retailer Aria, designed by Groupwork leads by Amin Taha is vaguely noticeable

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on the street, in contrast to the well publicity in the architecture world and its social media when it finished at 2017.

The appear-to-be renovated building is, in fact, a new infill at the corner of an original Victorian, but Palladian inspired block between the beautiful Barnsbury Street and Waterloo terrace, its seamless continuity in this intact Palazzo( Figure 2) is mainly on account of the echo with the end building at the opposite side facing South as a result of the same massing and height built( Figure 3). The building deceives most of the passersby in its ‘ordinary’ form hiding among the terraced buildings of various scales and appearances in this historic thoroughfare of Islington 4, not to mention the diverse retail shop frontages distract the pedestrians on the ground level from looking vertically for a whole picture. The ‘ordinary’ form was presented in both the well-aged terracotta building color which portrays a nostalgic existence and the exact same windows, pilasters & consoles, parapets and so on with the rest of the facades in the premise.

However, in this rare empty land caused by the bomb attack during World War II, the new occupant was not supposed to be ordinary. The Aria building stands out for itself in a most discreet way.

While the shell including the roof made by terracotta and cement casting was a 1:1 hollow replica of the former building, the design team countered their own approach of imitation through puncturing the new windows of upper floors at the ‘wrong’ place according to the needs of the internal residential function.

Furthermore, the mimic of the past with a very modern construction process under all the trials and errors stimulated a more profound notion of representation of past traditions.5

4 Upper Street North (CA19) Conservation Area Design Guidelines (January 2002), 18.2 5 Architects’ Journal (30 October 2017)

https://www.architectsjournal.co.uk/buildings/a-deliberately-imperfect-restoration-upper-streetby-groupwork-amin-taha/10022145.article

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This essay was triggered when the ‘invisibility’ of the building in the large urban setting as mentioned before occurred to me. Through exploring the design philosophy and manufacturing method of the casting shell, it aims to open a discussion of the significance and potential usage of mounding and casting in the historical environment.

2. Molding & Casting Function as the external and internal finishes, the insulation and the loadbearing structure, as well as a ‘book page’ tells the story of the neighborhood due to its merit of uniform, such a block was a product of in-situ cast constituted 300 pieces, then assembled at the site. Through the 3D survey and scanning of the building at the other end and the archival records of the ‘existing’ structure, the digitalized façade was drawn and projected onto the negative polysterene mold. The windows, skirtings, cornices and the anaglypta wallpaper patterns (Figure 4) were then all cast into a single block.

It is no doubt that the project bears a resemblance to the works created by Rachel Whiteread, the first woman artist that won the Turner Prize at 1993.

Whiteread frees her found daily objects like furnitures or the symbol of the space like windows, even the whole house from practical use, suggesting a new permanence, imbued with memory6 through molding and casting. The manual process of ‘copy and paste’ certainly created some sensual engagement between the maker and the medium, further transformed the idea and certainly the outcome.

6 Gaogosian, Rachel Whiteread Detached exhibition description (2013)

https://gagosian.com/exhibitions/2013/rachel-whiteread-detached/

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Figure 4 Detail section of Aria building facade

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History Plaster cast which helped to shape the artistic movements in history was the pioneer of such methodology both Amin Taha and Rachel Whiteread shared, using the mold solidified from the liquid to create a 3-dimensional form. Its application could be traced millennium BC ago in Egypt, but in this article, we will focus on its influential value in terms of preservation in the relative modern European history (17th-19th century) when the plaster cast was to provide the replicas of mostly the masterworks of the ancient art.

It was extensively used since the 1750s in Académie des Beaux-Arts founded in Paris to support the architectural pedagogy of studying, analyzing & remodeling the antique models of Greek’s or Roman’s. During the 19 th century in England, perhaps it was the barriered English Channel distanced the island from the continent, the comparatively late-matured discovered passion for the ruins of archelogy and the classical art went viral, plaster cast for the antiques became a popular collection. For instance, Architect Sir John Soane designed his own terraced mansion at Lincoln’s inn field to accommodate the plaster cast in his daily life, and most importantly to showcase those treasures. Those collections were as though put in an anachronic surreal museum accompanied by the cooking sound from the basement kitchen. Also, the outstanding exhibition at Cast Court in Victoria and Albert Museum proves that English has definitely leveled up the game of plaster cast.

The Democracy Though the color and the texture might vary accordant to the purpose of the reproduced objects, the prototype of plaster cast was white and uniform costed relatively low. Hence it accelerated the accessibility for scholars and artists in the field of applied art including architecture. As a reference to the researched 7

subject and a method to put the ideas together through the hands, the 3dimensional, standard and unified characters ensured equality at the fundamental stage of pedagogy. Unlike the natural stone which could also be sculpted 3 dimensionally, the core value of the molding and casting is about the versatility of its production process, the molding liquid can be anything so long as it is able to hold the shape. On that account, the adaptive ability of the materiality is flexible and convertible subject to the purposes and users, the choices can vary from plasters as the main reference in this article to the resins, or glutinous rice in the Asian context.

The use of plaster cast indeed brought the revolution not just for the educated crowd but also for the ‘public taste’. While it might have symbolized the colonization in some ways, there was no denying that it was a rather democratic tool in the cultural discourses. Napoleon was among one of the first few ‘official speakers’ when he commanded to copy the artworks or monuments of which he couldn’t acquire through casting when he was traveling in Europe and North Africa. His ambition was debatable, however, the consequence resulted from the widespread of the country pride through those plaster cast collections, in a way, awoke the ethos of the power of art and culture to the ordinaries, they could then see the world in Paris’s places or musées rather than traveling across the Mediterranean Sea. Napoleon was also the one authorized the first plaster cast shipping to the United States.

In encyclopedia purposed museums, portable and anachronic attributes of plaster cast brought the opportunity for culture comparison and exchange despite the origins and hierarchies of the subjects. The objects without context were like blank papers up for the reinterpretations. In a place like Cast Court of V&A, the visitors are able to travel the whole spans of history and experience the monuments of the world in one synoptical view11. A horse’s leg needed more attention than the effigy of a queen because of the extra efforts of using the

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metal armature in supporting the thin leg addressed during construction. And how do these features tackle towards the disposition of architecture? In the next chapter, the attempted analysis will be unfolded citing the example of NO.168 Upper Street.

3. Authenticity of Molding & Casting

Scrape or Anti-Scrape was a debate essentially in the research of the answer of authenticity which is a well-recognized underline within the historical urban environment because it reflects the respect to the local characters of an urban grain. As Robin Christie explained, the substructure of the authenticity is to identify the ‘old’ and ‘new’ and to counter it, there are three usual contemporary design ideas, imitation, deference and juxtaposition 7. Arguably, the Aria Building has the nature of the three, but it may be depicted having none of any on the other hand.

In Leading’s book 11, she described a story from ‘In search of lost time’ by Marcel Proust8 that Charles Swann(the main character in the book) was very disappointed about his visit of a Medieval church in a humdrum surrounding because the casted replica in the Tracadéro museum of Paris gave him much more details he needed and a much better environment for appreciation. The inevitable dilemma of plaster cast challenged the morality of honoring the origins, the decision was seemed the call of viewers’ depending on which narratives of history were to be the pursuit. Or would the plaster casting be once

7 Robyn Christie, Old Fabric, New Fabric and the Problem of Authenticity, Australia ICOMOS

Conference (6 November 2015) p. 2 8 Marcel Proust (1871-1922), French novelist, critic

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discarded in a certain period of history in virtue of lacking the authenticity be an ideal solution or mediator in place of ‘Scrape’ and ‘Anti-Scrape’?

The anachronism of casting process broke the law of history system, it embodied the truth of architecture with crisper details might have even surpassed the origins on site but at the same time juxtaposed with the past by its own appearance and the nature of portability. This chapter will discuss how do molding and casting react to the issue of authenticity.

Memory & Monument through ‘Misremember’

Figure 5 Photo of Upper Street on 1869, the building on the right shows the previous structure

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The archelogy aspect of the cast process served as a documentation of the dug artifacts also reflects in the architecture world. Aria building is a fair, in fact, a detailed record of an artifact. As the Islington planning assessment indicated, it would continue to preserve and enhance the character and appearance of the Upper Street (North) Conservation Areas. 9 This design method of Groupwork, first of all, requested the professionals to have a rigorous study of the previous building (Figure 5)which disappeared in the public eyes for years. Although it was a newly built project, it retained the authenticity through a reproduction of the past following the ‘Scrape’ conception as Violet-le-Duc had been practicing.

The negative polystyrene mold was diligently modeled and cut in order to cast the final big scaled structure, each fragment was composed accurately to retain the ‘old’ (Figure 6). As a perfect remnant of the past, the mediated presence of the façade stitched the broken memory map of the urban landscape in Islington.

Nevertheless, the significance of Aria building was not just expressed through imitation and/or deference of the history but also conveyed via ‘misremembered past’ 10 with its modern intervention.

The plaster cast, especially for the architectural large pieces, relied on the print media hinted a potential for disorder. In a sub-heading “Cast in Situ, Lost at Sea” of Mari Leading’s book11, she said errors were made in re-assembling the cast pieces, taxonomies were failed for the works of Museum including choices of where the casts should be made, how they might be mounted and the troubles in moving them.

This default of casting had occurred to the design team of Aria Building as well, although the intention of being honest to the previous building was firm so as

9 NO.168 Upper Street Planning Committee Report (29th June 2015) 4.2 10 Groupwork, Project description

http://groupwork.uk.com/#

11 Mari Leading, Plaster Monuments: Architecture and the Powder of Reproduction (Princeton

University Press, 2017) p. 277, p. 170, chapter 2

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emphasized by the local development authority 9, the accuracy of the origin was hard to maintain due to the possible ‘fatality’ over the CAD drawing transitions, the missing lines on the negative mold, or the displacement of the blocks caused by the site workers. However, the imperfection of the construction process was encouraged in this project to support the idea of ‘misremember’10, suggesting the monumental memory in our mind was often modified to suit our present and future after all10. The disorder stimulated creation, as though the designers were playing a jigsaw, re-narrated the past story through deconstruction, reassembly and collage adapted to different purposes (Figure 7).

The building completed itself hereto as a monument stretching across the notion of time. And it became rather deceiving for the people because in spite of the unfamiliar skin, they are still able to grasp the historical authenticity from the familiar massing and scale in the familiar urban setting. But even of the unfamiliar material or in another phrase, the medium of a building, the content was considered moral and authentic to the locals.

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Figure 6 Facade molding and casting process

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Figure 7 Elevation at Barnsbury street

Figure 8 Detail of the cast panels

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Figure 9 Interior view

The Monolithic Block Having transcended their precedents dating back to the 17 th century, the casting of NO.168 was more than a study tool, but a refined display. The monolithic merit of a cast object contributed to the monumental identity.

In an earlier submission and assessment document 12, there were four public groups opposed to the idea of the casted block, some went against using terracotta rather than the vernacular brick, most of them claimed the window spacing and placement were inappropriate. The reconfiguration or rather, insertion of the ‘new’ functional windows framed with brass plates on the ‘existing’ façade(Figure 8) followed the ‘misremember’ philosophy share a same 12 NO.168 Upper Street Planning Committee Report (15th July 2014) 8.3

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attitude with Anti-Scrape; they appeared to be positioned at the ‘wrong’ place from outside, but as a matter of fact, made every sense for the residents inside(Figure 9).

In a close examination (Figure 8), the joints of each panel showed the trace of the making even for the circumstance of the modern digital process, they are just like the cast of Trajan column in V&A museum distinguished themselves from the exact reproduction of history. We start to understand the collection value of the plaster cast, in actual fact the imperfection of it despite the era it was made show the man-made craftsmanship rather than mass production, but in a more democratic material.

With such a rich content on it, the monolithic casted block does need to bear a certain degree of responsibility, perhaps more than the conventional mortar and bricks. While it can be tested on the mock-ups as many times as possible, it requests comprehensive information and multi-dimensional thinking on how to compose all the narratives and cope with the history and the urban environment into one single object at the same time. One can argue the law of ‘old’ and ‘new’ was broken, the authenticity of the object was blurred as it was no longer in the chronicle order of history.

We gathered the method of casting enabled the designers uncouple the architectural experience from the ‘original’ building, broadened the horizon to a perhaps more multi-disciplinary realm of art and culture.

4. Conclusion Through the parallel narration of ‘What’ and ‘How’, this essay took Aria Building for the case study to elaborate on how the casting as the medium of the building, at the same time function as the coping mechanism negotiated the history and the presence in the architectural historical environment. In the 16

‘What’ part, the article intended to investigate the history, evaluate the characters of the molding & casting process through the precedent plaster cast which was relevant and significant in the world of architecture and design. It aims to lead myself or the individuals who are interested to engaging and exploring further on this subject.

Recently The V&A museum is acquiring a three-storey section including exterior and interior of a demolishing Brutalism architecture example Robin hood Gardens for display in their new museum in the East of London. One would argue it is ironic that the plaster-cast way of exhibition as a learning tool has changed the Museumification. But to be noted, who says the real building is not a concrete cast artifact?

In 2016, the most exciting event in the public cultural scene of London would probably be the exhibition of the ‘fake’ Palmyra’s Arch in Trafalgar Square. The impressive technology of programming the vanished structure destroyed by ISIS in the year before through visual photos submitted by thousand netizens showed the determination to keep the tradition of architectural heritage. But this time, the displayed Arch sacrificed from the war was not made from plaster or other equivalent material, it was the solid Egyptian stone carved by the Carrara men employing the technique of casting, placed in a square that commemorated the war victory.

Are the tables turned? Will it be an age of cast Renaissance? Or Perhaps nothing is new, it is only the way how we see them is changing.

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Figures Figure 1 Aria Building, looking South from Upper Street ....................................... 2 2019. Author Figure 2 Upper Street Facades ............................................................................... 3 2017. Download from Architects' Journal.co.uk Figure 3 Two anchor tenant buildings .................................................................... 3 2019. Author Figure 4 Detail section of Aria building facade .................................................... 6 2017. Download from Architects' Journal.co.uk edit by Author Figure 5 Photo of Upper Street on 1869, the building on the right shows the previous structure ................................................................................................... 10 1869. Download from Avontuura.com, photography by Tim Soar Figure 6 Facade molding and casting process .................................................. 13 Download from Avontuura.com, photography by Tim Soar Figure 7 Elevation at Barnsbury street .................................................................. 14 2017. Download from Architects' Journal.co.uk Figure 8 Detail of the cast panels ......................................................................... 14 Download from Dezeen.com, photography by Tim Soar Figure 9 Interior view .............................................................................................. 15 2017. Download from Architects' Journal.co.uk

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Retrieved on December 28, 2019 from https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2016/apr/19/palmyras-triumphal-arch-recreated-intrafalgar-square 11. GROUPWORK ‘Misremembers’ Former Building in London. Karl Van Es (2019).

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Architects’ Journal (2017). Retrieved on December 14, 2019 from https://www.architectsjournal.co.uk/buildings/a-deliberately-imperfect-restoration-upperstreet-by-groupwork-amin-taha/10022145.article 13. Project Upper Street. Groupwork (2017). Retrieved on December 14, 2019 from http://groupwork.uk.com/# 14. Amin Taha creates distorted replica of 19th-century London terrace block.

Tom Ravenscroft (2019). Retrieved on December 14, 2019 from https://www.dezeen.com/2019/04/01/amin-taha-groupwork-168-upper-street-london/ 15. Rachel Whiteread Detached. Gagosian Gallery (2013). Retrieved on January 08, 2020 from https://gagosian.com/exhibitions/2013/rachel-whiteread-detached/ 16. Streets with a story: The book of Islington. Eric A Willats FLA (1986). Retrieved on January 08, 2020 from https://www.islington.gov.uk/-/media/sharepoint-lists/publicrecords/leisureandculture/information/adviceandinformation/20182019/20190115streetsw ithastoryjanuary2019.pdf 17. 168 Upper Street N1 Planning Committee Report. Development Management Service (2015). Retrieved on December 14, 2019 from https://democracy.islington.gov.uk/documents/s4773/168%20Upper%20Street%20Committ ee%20Report.pdf 18. 168 Upper Street N1 Planning Committee Report. Development Management Service (2014). Retrieved on December 14, 2019 from https://democracy.islington.gov.uk/documents/s1488/168%20upper%20street%20N1.pdf 19. London Borough of Islington Archaeological Priority Areas Appraisal. Alison Bennett, Teresa O’ Connor, Katie Lee-Smith (2018). Retrieved on January 10, 2020 from https://historicengland.org.uk/content/docs/planning/apa-islington/ 20. Upper Street North (CA19) Conservation Area Design Guidelines. Islington Council. Retrieved on January 10, 2020 from https://www.islington.gov.uk/search?q=conservation+areas&via=docs&sortOrder=datedsc 21. Robbin Hood Gardens. V&A museum. Retrieved on January 12, 2020 from https://www.vam.ac.uk/articles/robin-hood-gardens 22. Survey of London: Volume 47, Northern Clerkenwell and Pentonville. Edited by Philip Temple (2008). Retrieved on December 14, 2019 from https://www.britishhistory.ac.uk/survey-london/vol47/pp439-455