Scenes at the Barbican The City of London's Centre for Arts and Conferences

Abstract

I. The quarter century from concept to concrete ,0UTER defence to city or castle' is the historic function of barbicans. In the City of London's new Barbican Centre the imagery of a fortress or stronghold,lives on in the use of massive concrete structures, including three seemingly impregnable residential tower blocks soaring some 400 feet above street level. For several years now I have been accompanying groups of students to the Barbican. My purpose was to show the unfolding grand plan for the area: the complete, comprehensive redevelopment of a large portion of the City of London as a part -commercial and wise before its time part residential enclave. Here the post war planners' desire to segregate vehicles and pedestrians is seen in itS most extreme realisation: pedestrians up aloft on windswept 'decks'. By and by there has been more to see than 'Route 11' (the unconnected dualled carriageway along London Wall) flanked by curtain wall office blocks of the 1960s. By 1975 the residential Barbican estate, comprising some 2000 flats of 140 assorted shapes and sizes in 21 less diverse blocks, was complete, and although initially for rent, these pieds-a-terre-au-soleil are now being offered for sale on leases of 125 years. Many have been acquired by public as well as private City institutions and firms. The Barbican's first major public attraction was the Museum of London, opened in December 1976, and by 1978 joint winner of the 'museum of the year' award. The building itself has likewise been feted, and Bryan Appleyard's admiration of Powell and Moya's 'beautiful variations and careful detailing ... late modernism at its cool and satisfying best' (The Times 20 November 1982) is widespread among architectural critics. Now, however, the centre.of attraction and international publicity is the Barbican Centre. Not that centre implies 'at the heart, easily reached' in this context. Indeed, the Museum of London could have served as a warning: it's fine once you get inside. Although crisp Warboys-style blue and white signs point you generally towards the museum, it shuns the adjoining streets. And so it is with the Barbican Centr:e, as I will reveal shortly.