Thinking

The Weston Williamson mission statement talks about Creating Civilised Cities so quite often I am asked what constitutes a civilised city. The big picture answer is that our work encourages people to use safe, efficient, convenient, well designed public transport rather than their cars and free the streets for pedestrians and cyclists.

Valerie Le Vaillant, who recently became Master of the Company of Architects, has announced that apprenticeships are to be her major focus for the year. This is a subject close to my heart. I am as passionate about social mobility as others rightly are about race and gender equality. To me social mobility embraces all types of inequality and disadvantage. As a member of Valerie's Education Committee under John Assael as Chair, I will do everything I can to help.

The story goes that Ernest Hemingway was challenged to write a novel in six words. His brilliant response was “For Sale. Baby shoes, never worn”. It conjures up a tale of grief, heartbreak and tragedy. All in six words.

I’ve just read Jeroen De Flander’s book “The Art of Performance”. He cites numerous examples where people of all ages and abilities have achieved greatness through demonstrating three stages of behaviour: 1. Passion and Purpose 2. Deep Practice and 3. Persistence.

It is 20 years since the opening of the Jubilee Line Extension - just in time for the Millenium - and city infrastructure schemes are still learning from it.

At Dubai Cityscape I gave a presentation promoting the advantages of Polycentric Cities citing London as an example. London was formed from small distinct communities such as Chelsea, Dalston, Hampstead and Brixton, which have grown together into a fantastic world city. The extensive underground rail system has helped enormously bind the city together but even now there are distinct communities.

I was recently on a trip to Toronto to liaise with clients and to present our thinking around ‘Transit Oriented Development’ - TOD

I remember a TV interview with Paul McCartney and (I think) Michael Parkinson where they were discussing the writing of 'I saw her standing there'. McCartney proudly sang his first lines 'She was just seventeen. She could have been a beauty queen’ when John Lennon suggested the second line should be 'You know what I mean'.

I’ve just been listening to Carly Simon talking about the writing of 'You're so Vain'. It's a brilliant pop song - in August 2014, the UK's Official Charts Company crowned it the ultimate song of the 1970s. Like most creations it feels as though it came together easily and perfectly.

This month, Kuwait is hosting a symposium on the subject of “Happiness in the City”. The event will provide a unique platform for cultural, creative and technical minds from the UK and the Gulf to explore the issue of how our built environments can be designed to promote happiness and wellbeing. The symposium has been organised by the RIBA in conjunction with the DiT.

As we contemplate how our high streets must reinvent themselves in light of the rise of online and the shift toward the experiential, it is perhaps not a coincidence that we are seeing the shopping centre break free from its internalised focus and look much more urban.

The emphasis on reducing carbon emissions is forcing all of us to examine the way we travel. Greta Thunberg sailed to New York over 15 days rather than flying in six hours. This is commercially unsustainable for most businesses. But there could be other solutions.

Mark Twain said “The two most important days of your life are the day you were born and the day you find out why”. I can’t remember the first but I remember the second as though it was yesterday.

Exploring the concept of remote airport check-in facilities and how they could be applied to a central London setting. Utilising the existing Royal Mail underground infrastructure to create a network of check-in facilities which are integrated with the transport network serving London's airports.

Last month I took part in a seminar organised by Blueprint Magazine on the Future of the Architect. I started my presentation with the classic image of Buzz Aldrin of Apollo 11 on the surface of the moon. I was 12 at the time of the Apollo 11 mission and that single event made a lasting impression on me, along with a belief that we as a race can conquer any obstacle to achieve our ambitions.

The excitement of visiting a new global city is unbounded - the buildings, the spaces, the infrastructure, the people, the culture - all to be experienced and explored. First impressions are said to stick, so with a few days in Toronto supporting the growth of our new studio, I set about making some initial judgements on how the city made me feel.

Suburban Pocket Paths could provide an antidote to Melbourne’s large parks; decentralised small or medium size open spaces dotted around the suburbs. 

Many architects view the completion of their projects as the day the building is handed over and they move on to other things. The shop has opened for trading, the occupants have moved in to the office, the builders have moved out of the house, the snagging done, the final completion certificate issued. Like an artist who finishes a painting, sells it and never sees it again, we get sucked in to the project and when it has “ended”, seldom give it another thought or learn other than immediate superficial lessons from it.