\"Architecture has to be alive\"

17 May 2005

The Prospect debate on iconic architecture provoked a lively discussion. The event addressed the issue of why the icon debate provokes such passion today. The panel and audience tried to define what we mean by iconic and why today so many buildings are labelled iconic before the contractor breaks ground.

In April Prospect hosted its first live debate on the subject of iconic architecture. For the past couple of years there have been critical whisperings about the magical ‘Bilbao Factor’, the idea that an adventurous piece of architecture by a high-profile architect can magically transform the image and economic fortunes of a city.

There has also been a growing concern about so-called ‘Starchitects’ and ‘shape-making architecture’, the creation of weird and wonderful geometries made possible by overly complex engineering solutions, heavily loaded with symbolism and designed to provoke pride, awe and emotion among visitors.

Things came to a head last year in a full-scale attack on iconic architecture by Graham Morrison, a director at Allies and Morrison Architects. Morrison used the AJ/Bovis architecture awards to talk about the ‘bad icon’, attacking Daniel Libeskind’s London Metropolitan University as a ‘cultural placebo’ and Will Alsop’s Fourth Grace in Liverpool as a ‘doughnut on sticks’.

The Prospect debate was organised to coincide with the publication of two books, one by Miles Glendinning, The Last Icons: Architecture beyond Modernism, and the other by Charles Jencks, The Iconic Building: The Power of the Enigma. Both books try to situate the preoccupations with icons within a broader social context, so it seemed appropriate to discuss them in a public forum. The two authors were joined on the platform by Christophe Egret, of Studio Egret West and a former director in Will Alsop’s studio and the man charged with designing the emblematic Cloud building as part of Liverpool’s Fourth Grace, and Austin Williams, the technical editor of Architects Journal. An audience of 120 people joined the speakers in a lively debate at the Britannia Panopticon building, an old Music Hall, in Glasgow city centre.

To open the debate each speaker gave a brief introduction in which they described their standing in relation to the debate. Charles Jencks described himself as a neo-realist, someone that is not entirely happy with the current approach of society to the commissioning of buildings, but recognises that it is difficult to challenge contemporary culture and economic realities through architecture. He said that the Bilbao effect was a real effect, that buildings could transform the fortunes of a city, and as a result clients and the public were keen on the iconic.
Jencks believes that the rise of the iconic building is a product of a society in which our belief systems, particularly Christianity, have collapsed. The proliferation of symbolism and metaphors in architecture is an attempt to fill the gap left by the departure of meaning and ideological certainty.

For Jencks the rise of the icon is inevitable and the issue should be how you create good icons. Good icons, in his view, are buildings that are not just one-liners but embody layers of metaphors and enigmatic signals that touch the human imagination and provoke a response whether it be joy or disgust.

Miles Glendinning had already begun this debate with Jencks on a Newsnight programme inspired by the Prospect debate earlier in the month, so his presentation focused not on the content of his book, but on Jencks’ argument that the rise of the icon was an inevitable consequence of economic and social conditions. Glendinning believes that the ‘rich world of architectural criticism’ is being debased by the trends identified by Jencks and that architects are acquiescing too readily to the demand that buildings become little more than brands. He refuses to accept the idea that ordinary buildings need to be “dressed up like something from a theme park.” He argued that in the Victorian period you had far greater technological change and social and cultural upheaval, but that the civic ethos expressed by both public and private sector led to a more rooted and thoughtful architecture. “Today, we live in a less dynamic society and yet we produce architecture that is chosen to ape the most chaotic forces in society,” said Glendinning . He called on architects to stop indulging in this second wave of post-modernism and bring some engagement and sobriety to their work.

Christophe Egret brought the experience of the practitioner to the discussion. “I am responsible for some unusual looking buildings,” he conceded. He described his experience at the Architectural Association and later working with Will Alsop as an act of ‘discovery’.

“The atmosphere in the Alsop office was not about commercialism or a political stance, but how to make life better, more interesting. Architecture has to be fun and surprising. It’s a process of discovery that can lead to ‘in-your-face’ architecture or a much more sober response”. He argued that he did not set out to produce an icon with Peckham library, but that a number of issues, plus the fact that it won the Stirling Prize had transformed it into an icon. He expressed concern that the anti-icon lobby would lead to a kind of architectural Puritanism with polite rules of architectural engagement.
“I think in all art, there is a stream of artist or architects that work to break conventions and to free themselves from the orthodoxy. Architecture has to be alive, to change its path,” added Egret.

Austin Williams, the final speaker, tried to situate the debate in a broader context. Williams argued that the debate on icons should not be taken on face value. He believes that the debate hides a set of limited aspirations that influence both sides of the debate and undermine our capacity to produce high quality architecture and meaningful architectural criticism. He summarised the zeitgeist as one in which we are overly risk-conscious, in which we dedicate our energies into managing human needs and demands instead of meeting them and in which there is an overbearing obsession with creating social capital.

As a consequence of this culture there is a trend to view architecture in a very instrumentalist fashion, as something that can build social consensus, engineer human aspirations, while at the same time limiting our impact on the environment. Williams rejected the idea of the iconic building on the grounds that it was no longer a measure of the gold standard for architecture, but was seen as a golden goose that could be used to achieve other social and economic objectives. In other words, he complained, architectural criticism had given way to instrumentalism.

The audience’s concerns were to define what we meant histroically by ‘icon’ and how that discussion differed from today. A few participants argued that we should have a vote from the floor, but when asked to raise their hands in favour or against iconic architecture people clearly found it very difficult to decide on which side of the fence they stood, even the speakers who appeared to divide neatly into the iconophobes and iconoclasts proved to be a much more ambiguous panel. Simon Chadwick, a lecturer at the Mackintosh School of Architecture, raised a discussion about context and the inappropriate nature of many of these iconic buildings within the historic core of the city. Ian Wall, of the EDI, said that he realised that the problem of icons had reached serious proportions when he opened a masterplan framework for the redevelopment of a peripheral estate in Edinburgh in which the consultant was proposing the creation of several ‘iconic’ buildings in among the housing. Wall expressed concern that this kind of approach seriously detracted from the task of addressing the brief and the programme.

In this cultural battle it is difficult to take sides. Morrison et al are right that there have been many gestures attempting to endow some buildings and the institutions that they house with significance through architectural symbolism. But others are correct to argue that there is a conservative streak behind demands that contemporary buildings be contextual and inoffensive. The attack on the icon is part of a reactionary attack on the so-called ‘architectural ego’, the passion that drives architects to design ambitious buildings in their own image.

Interestingly, the iconoclasts and the anti-iconoclasts share many assumptions about the power of architecture. Over the past few years it has become increasingly popular for politicians, clients and building professionals to make exaggerated claims for their projects. Whether buildings are flamboyant and iconic or understated and restrained, the claim is that architecture can be used to reconstruct the public sphere, enhance self-esteem and engender economic activity. These arguments are not restricted to big cultural and political projects such as the Guggenheim at Bilbao or the City Hall building in London, they are also made in relation to more mundane buildings such as schools and hospitals. While our buildings reflect and reinforce what we are, they cannot create an ethos for political institutions, or conjure social bonds out of thin air. These are problems that are only susceptible to social solutions.

Much of contemporary architectural thinking is grounded in a polemic against modernism and even classicism. The ‘hierarchy of spaces’ and the ‘orchestration of movement through a building’ are out; provocative spaces designed to give users a unique ‘experience’ and solicit emotion are de rigueur. Everybody is hankering after ‘flexible’ spaces designed on the assumption that users’ own activity will define the nature of the place, rather than being guided by the architecture. At the same time most discussion of architecture today is coloured by the belief that architecture has a significant social and cultural impact and can be used as a tool to generate economic activity or to increase self-esteem. Whatever the shape of the buildings produced in the next two decades, this assumption will underwrite much of the commissioning process and influence the design.

Thank you to everyone that participated in the debate particularly our sponsors, McClure Naismith. If Prospect readers have ideas that they think should be debated in future we would be very pleased to hear from you. Please e-mail your ideas to tim.abrahams@carnyx.com.


Charles Jencks, The Iconic Building: The Power of the Enigma is published by Frances Lincoln and cost £19.99. Miles Glendinning, The Last Icons: Architecture beyond Modernism is published by Graven Images as part of a series of essays produced by The Lighthouse.