T8 Lecture 02: What makes up the contemporary city?

Politicks, politicks, politicks and architecture somewhere in between. Owen Hatherley is a very critical voice. He is not trained as an architect so his words were free of preconceptions and educated judgements of what should be considered beautiful and good yet his outlook carried a very Left sided bearing. The slides he’s shown were amateur but very real, they were the holiday photos you wouldn’t like to have in your album. It was interesting to hear what non-architect that actually pays attention to his environment observed.

I hear there were 3 Britain’s before II World War and 2 more since:
1) Oxford standing for Tories international prominence
2) Sheffield steelworks and sublime, deeply inhumane social housing of the north of England
3) Suburban, increasingly leisured capitalism of mainly south of the country
4) Post war settlement in a form of council estates and new towns of social democracy
5) Blair colourful flats of newly found urbanism

Britain 5 counts for the last 30 years of British cityscapes and it was the primary subject of the critique.The cityscapes of 1990’s Blairism have turned out to be brittle and superficial with little space in between high density blocks of residence covered with colored paneling, terracotta, pale wood or glass. They replaced some old urban fabric under numerous Regeneration Schemes of 1980’s and 90’s that still continue today.

Owen recalls examples of 1980’s sub urban Ocean Village right in the centre of London next to metropolis like, strictly controlled Canary Wharf. He calls 1990’s Sheffiels high density student housing ‘blaisboxes’. He has no mercy for BDP’s West Key in Southampton, or Park Hill in Sheffield by Urban Splash. He suggests regeneration shame designed by one, and executed by the fourth party, timidly founded by whoever is in power cannot be good. It’s hard to disagree with him.

The up-down policies failed to recognize the inhabitant of all these shames.
Owen Hatherley however leaves us a positive note at the end of his lecture. Beautiful or not doesn’t matter here, these were citizen initiatives, to make space of their own or to build community block they actually wanted to live in.