Property News · January 31, 2016

A concrete future


Brutalist buildings are back in fashion, and local authorities are realising their potentialFor me the most exciting building in any town is always the brutalist one. It is architecture on heat: it struts, invites you to rub its porridgey skin and goggle at its projections. There is a reason that music videos are shot in them, rather than in drab supermarkets.Over the past couple of years I have been writing a book about brutalism, Concrete Concept, and I have noticed that change is afoot. The style has been re-appraised for some time now, and not just among the aficionados. In an era of wavering faith in capitalism, brutalism’s robust statements are finding a fresh audience. Buildings such as Erno Goldfinger’s Trellick Tower in west London, or Leeds University, once the butt of endless jokes, are now some of the country’s hippest structures. They serve as squat grey ripostes to the 10-a-penny oligarch vanity projects that seem to arrive daily on the skyline. Continue reading…

Source : theguardian.com
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