Letters - Letter to the Editor

Architectural Review, The, April, 2001

POWER TO MOCKBEE

SIR: Your issue (AR March) on 'More with Less' was useful, showing that architects can make contributions to the welfare of all, not just a privileged class of the rich. But I'm confused about the school in Los Angeles by Morphosis. Clearly it is not for the privileged few, as your reviewer points out, it is a 'complex architecture that is also public'. But surely the sectional moves which generate large cantilevers and (in some cases) apparently meaningless volumes, pleasing to the architects doubtless, but not to many others, must be pretty expensive. Can the school really be no more expensive than 'a conventional building'. All power to Mockbee and his Rural Studio.

Yours etc

JOANNA BROWNLOW

Ontario, Canada

BATTLE FOR BRITAIN

SIR: I am a consumer, not a creator, of architecture. Forgive me if I offer a rather different take from John Winter in his review of Single Family Houses: Concepts, Planning and Construction in the February AR (p89).

He starts with "'Yet another anthology of houses" one groans' before going on to a favourable review of the book, ending on the high of'... some of the houses are really marvellous -- I wanted to get on the next plane to Portugal to see the house in Moledo by Eduardo Souto de Moura'.

Well, when I finally got to see the book, so did I. Drawn to the RIBA bookshop by this review I also found other books displaying mouth-watering contemporary houses (but shelved under 'Interior Design' for some reason). While displaying fascinating diversity these houses had one thing in common: virtually none of them were built in Britain.

Flicking through past issues of AR, one has to go back to May 2000 before reaching a review of a house in this country -- and that not a complete house but a conversion (John Pawson's house). Since then some 20 foreign houses have been reviewed, plus any number of articles under 'Interior Design' with not a British domestic interior in sight. I wonder, in fact, when was the last time that a whole house for a private client (not an architect) was reviewed?

Now, this reflects either shameful neglect or an absence of material. I would like to believe the former, which would at least be a simple matter to correct. But I fear it's the latter. Our acceptance in this country of pastiche junk at the 'quality' end of the housing market can be confirmed by a drive round any suburb or a casual glance at the property section of any Sunday newspaper.

It is obvious to the most casual visitor to one of our European neighbours -- the Netherlands for instance -- that this need not necessarily be so. The lack of equivalent standards of domestic housing in Britain is, in fact, shameful. It's argued that the public only want 'traditional' (aka pastiche or derivative) houses. But 'the public' have little choice, for reasons that could be the subject of a whole different letter.

'It says much for the creativity of our profession' says Mr Winter 'that there are so many fine houses built that do not make our magazines'. Well, yes, but it says nothing at all about the profession that so few of them are built here -- whether recorded in magazines or not. The individual members of the profession may be blameless -- they can only build for clients. But the profession as a body stands in the dock -- if it's not responsible for creating conditions to enable domestic architecture to flourish, then who is? What is needed is a rage for change -- not weary ennui. Shouldn't you be taking a lead?

Yours etc

JOHN HUNTER

Orpington, Kent, UK

IRISH INSPIRATION

SIR: Buchholz McEvoy's local government offices near Dublin (AR February) were a real inspiration. This is how government should relate to electors: open, generous, welcoming and clear. If this is what Irish architecture is really like today, more in your pages please.

Yours etc

JOHN FOWLER

Sydney, Australia

BRAZIL NUTS

SIR: PLEASE ACT! The Brazilian congress is now voting on a project that will reduce the Amazon forest to 50 per cent of its .size. You may have seen that Greenpeace is today boycotting hardwood from the region. The area to be deforested is four times the size of Portugal and would be mainly used for agriculture and pastures for livestock. All the wood is to be sold to international markets in the form of wood chips, by multinational companies.

The truth is that the soil in the Amazon forest is useless without the forest itself. Its quality is very acidic and the region is prone to constant floods. At this time more than 160 000 square kilometres deforested with the same purpose are abandoned and in the process of becoming deserts.

Deforestation (and the subsequent processing of the wood chips) on this scale will also release a huge amount of carbon (which is currently locked up in the wood) back into the atmosphere worsening the problem of climate change. We cannot let this happen.

Yours etc

FERNANDA DE SOUZA SAVIOLO

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

RANDY BROWN'S SCHOOLDAYS

SIR: When I was a student at UCLA in 1991, my professor Frank Israel had one of his projects published in the AR and it made Frank very proud to be on the cover. As a student I dreamed of one day having my project on the cover. Ten years later my dream came true. Thank you for your interest in my work. The AR is the best magazine published today.