British Architects Research Articles

The mirror and the crèche: techniques for building and collapsing the world

In 1833, Sir John Soane, the British architect and antiquarian, bequeathed his house-museum, containing over 3,000 inventoried artifacts, to the British nation by a private act of Parliament. A century and a half later, in 1978, the American architect and industrial designer Alexander Girard gifted his global collection of 106,000 folk art objects to the state of New Mexico; a bequest of such magnitude that it expanded the provincial holdings of the Museum of International Folk Art fivefold. These men, as divergent as they were, in bearing and aesthetic disposition, amassed two of the most extensive and culturally significant collections in the world. What follows is an exploration of the experiences that seeded and positioned the role of collecting in the lives of these designers, and the revolutionary spatial effects that we have inherited as a result; how travel, longing, world-building, and forays into fiction shaped their impulse to collapse the world; and how the cultural and technological regimes of their eras shaped both the manner and matter of their collections.

ENGLISH ARCHITECTURE OF THE 16th-18th CENTURIES AND TRANSFORMATIONS OF ARCHITECTURAL ORDER

In this article, the author considers the evolution of the classical order in England from the second half of the 16th to the early 19th century.
 The research is based on two methods – stylistic analysis and analysis of historical and cultural aspects in the application of the classical order by English architects over more than three hundred years and the basic principles of or approaches to such application.
 It is concluded that the analysis of how the classical order was used can help us understand not only the style and idiom of every particular master but also develop a better understanding of the cultural situation or the context in which every particular architect worked.

A study of Building Information Modeling (BIM) uptake and proposed evaluation framework

Although BIM provides various benefits to the architecture, engineering, construction and facilities management (AEC/FM) industries, it lacks wider and comprehensive utilisation. This study assesses the understanding and perception of BIM uptake in UK architectural offices. The aim is to analyse and compare BIM adoption at the organisational level for the years 2011, 2014 and 2018 as well as to form the basis for an evaluation structure of its utilisation. The objectives of the study are to examine the level of BIM adoption and capability of UK architectural offices and to investigate the drivers and barriers to BIM usage. The research is based on online questionnaires made available to all Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) chartered members. The data are analysed through descriptive statistics, analysis of variance (ANOVA), regression and cross-tabulation. The results are discussed in terms of BIM usage and BIM readiness with regard to the company profiles. Companies are motivated to utilise BIM technology due to its facilitation of effective teamwork and project efficiency. However, the need for extensive training, a general lack of demand and its perceived sophistication in relation to day-to-day tasks are reasons why the use of BIM is avoided. The study concludes with key learning points from the questionnaire depending on three different years and the proposed evaluation framework to achieve improved utilisation of BIM.

Dialogic Criticism. Cedric Price’s Supplements, Reviews and Columns 1960–1999

For the radical British architect Cedric Price (1934–2003), architecture was above all a social art. Price considered architecture’s essential role in society to be that of creating “continuous dialogue”. This idea of architecture as a social process could equally apply to Price’s architectural discourse. As a public intellectual and polemicist, Price sought not only to reach a broader audience but also to stimulate a sense of societal awareness and public debate within the architectural profession. This article focuses on Price’s activity as a critic with the aim of defining some possible alternatives in architectural criticism’s relationship to public debate. More specifically, it makes a case for a “dialogic” approach to criticism based on Price’s creative experiments in mass media, journalism and writing.

Improvised Cities: Architecture, Urbanization, and Innovation in Peru

The spectacular growth of Lima's informal barriadas and pueblos jóvenes has long occupied a prominent place in the scholarly and popular imagination of Peru's twentieth-century history. For many, the image of Lima as a city of unconstrained and uncontrolled informal settlements was a singular symbol of what José Matos Mar dubbed the desborde popular that had overwhelmed Peru by the 1980s. Helen Gyger's new book, Improvised Cities, acknowledges the often-chaotic nature of twentieth-century urban Peru while also drawing attention to the innovative ways in which the country became a global leader in self-help housing—that is, housing and settlements that were built by their own residents. Gyger's book documents the serious attempts by architects, political leaders, academics, and everyday Peruvians to create sustainable, effective, and often quite innovative housing policies.Gyger's book is an interdisciplinary engagement that traces historical change along with theories of architecture, design, and urbanism. Gyger and the University of Pittsburgh Press should be applauded for producing a beautiful book with 61 images and 14 color plates that clearly demonstrate these case studies. After an introductory chapter that sets up the book's themes and summarizes different perspectives on urbanism in relation to Peru's development, the book proceeds in chronological fashion. Beginning in the 1950s, Gyger shows how Peru became a leader in self-help housing experimentation. Peru's conservative leaders eschewed top-down state housing projects in favor of encouraging informal settlements and self-help housing. As these barriadas quickly grew around Lima and other cities, John F. C. Turner, a British architect, arrived in Peru in 1957 and would go on to become one of the most influential advocates of self-help housing. Perhaps the most interesting of Gyger's discoveries is the strange consensus between the anarchist Turner and the conservative leaders of Peru in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Both groups were suspicious of state-led projects and instead promoted self-help housing that they both believed would empower residents. This consensus resulted in Peru creating a legal framework for the recognition of informal settlements and their planning.As the narrative moves into the later 1960s and 1970s, Gyger pays special attention to how Peruvian architects and everyday citizens engaged with global debates on self-help housing. These included proposals from US financial institutions to encourage self-help housing as well as the United Nations–sponsored competitions that invited leading global architects to create housing plans that were both affordable and avant-garde. Despite their flashy campaigns, Gyger argues, these plans were rather detached from the realities on the ground and ultimately futile. The final chapters of the book show how these failures began to raise new questions about informal settlements in Peru, even as their organization peaked during the military government of Juan Velasco Alvarado. Turner and other reformists began to question the embrace of self-help housing as a form of sidestepping large structural problems of inequality. The book's final chapter ends back at Peru's informal settlements in the 1980s, where the efforts of grassroots leftist activists are cut short by the arrival of Shining Path. Ultimately, self-help housing, with its elusive promises and flaws, continued, but now embraced by neoliberal reformers like Hernando de Soto.Ultimately, Gyger concludes that “aided self-help has often been more powerful as an idea than as a practice” (p. 378). This conclusion, and the detailed interdisciplinary analysis of many case studies that support it, will surely be of much interest to scholars of urbanism and urban history in Latin America. However, it also may prove disappointing to other historians hoping to understand how informal urban design either reflected or affected historical change in Peru. Unfulfilled plans, like the informal housing projects analyzed by Gyger, are still important to understand, especially if the reasons for their failure reveal important elements of Peruvian and Latin American history. Yet, it's often difficult to conclude if the often-unfulfilled nature of self-help housing analyzed in Gyger's book points more to specific failures of Peru's twentieth-century politics or to more general problems with the embrace of informality as a solution to urban growth in the developing world. Ultimately, I believe Gyger's book argues in favor of both factors, which may prove disappointing to some readers looking for a smoking gun to explain if self-help housing promotion has alleviated or worsened urbanism in Peru. Still, I would highly recommend this book for any historian of architecture, urbanism, or design. Gyger's detailed interdisciplinary approach is something that will hopefully appear in and inspire more urban histories of Latin America.

Redefining the Globe: An Interview with Murray Fraser on Architectural History for the 21st Century

The highly anticipated 21st edition of Sir Banister Fletcher’s Global History of Architecture was published in January 2020 by Bloomsbury in collaboration with the Banister Fletcher Trust, the Royal Institute of British Architects, and the University of London. Among many new features is an emphasis on the book’s ‘global’ reach, which reshapes its scope and structure. With all chapters written anew and encompassing architectural histories and sites across the globe over the past 5,500 years, the 21st edition of Banister Fletcher emerges at the forefront of the march towards global architectural history. This is a radical transformation of a classic book previously viewed as the Eurocentric canon’s centrepiece. The following interview with Murray Fraser, general editor of the new edition and professor of architecture and global culture at the Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London, explores the paths of his intellectual development, starting with changes from within the ‘centre’ — the former British Empire and its traditionally defined scope of architectural history — through to his eventual shift towards a global outlook. The conversation also offers a retrospective look at architectural education in the 20th century, now seen as a postcolonial ‘tipping point’, and discusses recent scholarship that led to the reformulation of Sir Banister Fletcher’s A History of Architecture. Ultimately, Fraser’s intellectual trajectory identifies two critical factors that ushered in the new Sir Banister Fletcher’s Global History of Architecture: a seismic change that took place within British architectural education, and the ensuing efforts to redefine architectural history for global audiences.

ПРИНЦИПИ СТВОРЕННЯ СТІЙКОЇ АРХІТЕКТУРИ ГРОМАДСЬКИХ БУДІВЕЛЬ НА ПРИКЛАДІ СВІТОВОЇ ПРАКТИКИ

In the last decade, including in relation to architecture, it is widely used the concept of "sustainability". This term correlates with the Sustainable Concep development), adopted by the UN as a strategic direction since the 1980s. The UN Commission on Environment and Development "Our Common Future" is sustainable development is defined as the way in which ―the needs of the present generation are met without limiting the ability of the next generation to meet its needs. " In the article, the authors consider the concept of sustainable architecture, which has been developing in recent years and offers solutions to urban planning and architecture through sustainable development in the field of construction and architecture. Technical opportunities for the development of architecture of the XXI century. are impressive in scale. At the same time, more and more architects have to take into account the significant impact that their projects have on the development of urban and natural environments. Urban architecture is still going by creating high-rise projects and compacting urban development. Modern metropolitan cities, being held hostage to the past path of their development and still little changed approaches to them buildings are gradually becoming a multi-factor problem, threatening the peace and security of residents. One of the ways to solve this problem is the concept of sustainable architecture that has emerged in the last decade. Its use by experts proves thatArchitecture of the XXI century. not only can maximize comfort and safety space for people, but also able to change the appearance of cities and improve their true state. Sustainable architecture allows you to create projects that meet the needs of people and at the same time, they not only take care of the conservation of natural resources, but also improve their condition environment. Well-known British architect N. Foster metaphorically defines the stand architecture as "a way to reach the maximum with minimal means". In the context of these processes, it must be acknowledged that architects can have a significant impact on restoration ecological balance and ensuring a high quality of life for people, creating architectural an environment that satisfies human needs while preserving or even improving the state of nature. Such an architectural environment is sustainable. It should be noted at the outset that the term in the scientific literature is clearly defined missing. This article aims to clarify the definition of sustainable architecture and to specify its basic principles in the analysis of both theoretical works and existing architectural solutions. Because sustainable architecture focuses primarily on technology characteristics of objects, their aesthetic expressiveness and style qualities become certain a problem that is not addressed in this text but is clearly understood by the authors. The term "sustainable architecture" has become widespread, leading to some leveling its value. The absence of clear boundaries in the definition may make it possible to overlook a sustainable architecture that in reality is only indirectly related to resilience. Not only consumers and users can be misled by this definition architectural objects, but investors and participants in the construction process. Along with the term "sustainable architecture" is often used by such concepts as "green architecture", "eco-sustainable construction", "ecological architecture", "low-cost architecture", "high technology architecture", "bioclimatic architecture", "Energy efficient and smart construction". All of these concepts are related in various ways to the technology of construction and operation of buildings, which aims to reduce consumption energy and material resources while maintaining or improving quality buildings and the comfort of their indoor environment. However, not all of them indicate qualitative, generic features of architecture as an aesthetic kind of project activity. The authors show the evolution in the field of construction from energy efficient architecture - to green architecture and further to sustainable architecture. Refine definitions of sustainable architecture, explore principles and criteria for evaluating sustainable architecture of public buildings and structures. The main purpose of the article is to find out the essence of the concept of sustainable architecture, its necessity and perspective in modern urban planning. To accomplish this, some problems need to be solved. Expand the concept of sustainable architecture, explore the principles and criteria for evaluating sustainable architecture, analyze the world experience of creating sustainable architecture in concrete examples, and show the prospects for the development and implementation of the concept of sustainable architecture in the world and in Ukraine. Sustainable architecture is a must for the functional (utility), technical (durability) and aesthetic (beauty) properties. The article provides examples of world-class sustainable architecture projects that create sustainable architectural environments and clearly demonstrate their superiority over traditional objects. The concept of sustainable architecture is very relevant for Ukraine.

ALISON AND PETER SMITHSON: A THEORETICAL CONCEPT OF BRUTALISM

The article illustrates the creative path of Alison and Peter Smithson, british architects of «brutalism». These architects gave substantiation in their theoretical essays and articles in which they explained their views and their architectural projects in the early 1950’s. The first Smithson’s realized project of the Hunstanton Secondary School, acquired the value of a manifesto. This building combined both the elements of traditional English architecture and the aesthetics of the «international style». The Golden Lane London City project was a series of «streets in the sky», uniting groups of apartments located above and below the level of the «street». The location of the residential blocks was determined by the topography of a particular place, or «context», and not by the geometric grid of the early modernist theory of planning. An illustration of the architectural program of the «New Brutalism» was the project The Upper Lawn Pavilion. In this project, the «frame» of Mies van der Rohe and the «free facade» of Le Corbusier was combine and transform. The Economist Plaza building complex was the next major Smithson’s project. It was centered around a plaza, that was a cross between the square and the transit zone, by which the architects sought to create a comfortable public space. Smithson’s, who were interested in new forms of social housing, created the Robin Hood Gardens complex in response to the concept of «Unité d’habitation» Le Corbusier. The idea of «streets in the sky» became a distinctive feature of their project, it suggested the presence of common balconies on every third floor that stretched across the entire building and were wide enough for walking and children’s games.As a result, the ideas that formed the theoretical basis of brutalism include the following: functionality, urbanism, courage of compositional solutions, reinforced concrete as the main building material, the principle of «honesty of the material», which denies any decoration of building materials. The aesthetics of brutalism is the simplicity of gross forms. These ideas influenced the further development of the architecture of the twentieth century, namely such areas as structuralism, metabolism and others.

Discovering the Byzantine Art of Building: Lectures at the RIBA, the Royal Academy and the London Architectural Society, 1843–58

ABSTRACTAlthough British architects played a major role in the rediscovery of the Byzantine monuments of Greece in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, earlier interest in the subject has remained obscure. Four lectures, read at the Royal Institute of British Architects, the Royal Academy and the London Architectural Society from 1843 to 1857, reflect a lively interest in Byzantine church architecture in the mid-nineteenth century. Delivered by Charles Robert Cockerell (1843), Edwin Nash (1847), Thomas Leverton Donaldson (1853) and John Louis Petit (1858), these lectures constitute some of the earliest attempts in England to explore both well-known monuments such as Hagia Sophia and lesser-known churches in Greece, Turkey and elsewhere. The manuscript records of these lectures show that influential British architects were not only familiar with Byzantine monuments, but were also able to look at them from the viewpoint of the designer and the builder. Emphasising the potential of Byzantine architecture to inform new design, they paved the way for the Byzantine revival, half a century later, and for the systematic investigation of Byzantine architecture from the late nineteenth century onwards.

“I am Amazed by Everything I See”: Trips of British Architects to the USSR. On the Question of the perception of Soviet Architecture and the Features of Communication between English and Soviet Architects in 1920–1930s

The article is dedicated to the problem of communication between Soviet and British architects in the period of 1920–1930s, which is very poorly studied in Russian and British historiography. The subject is thoroughly considered in two ways simultaneously. The author examines the political and socio-economic circumstances of such business trips in England. The main focus is on the professional goals and objectives of these visits, and on the reception and interpretation of Soviet architectural and urban planning practices by British architects. The second aspect to which attention is paid are the main points of the program for displaying Soviet architecture, which was organized by the host country. Since a number of visits to the USSR by foreign architects took place in the early 1930s, the nature of mutual interest in the creative experience of Soviet and English colleagues has been changing over the decades. The main objective of the work was an attempt to consider, to a first approximation, the initial stage of this relationship (late 1920s — 1930s) and the most important forms of communication between English and Soviet architects. The article analyses events organized by VOKS, Inturist, Soviet trade representatives, Society for Cultural Relations between the People of the British Commonwealth, and the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics. The work used materials from the Russian and British archives, including previously unpublished records of Berthold Lubetkin and Erno Goldfinger.

The Office of William Tite (1798-1873): Architecture at the Start of the Railway Age

This article looks at how William Tite’s office practice developed in the context of the financial and professional world in which he lived and worked. The office supported Tite’s activities for 50 years from c. 1823 until his death in 1873. He was one of the most successful English architects of the nineteenth century in terms of wealth and general reputation. His principal office was located in the City of London, close to his commercial clients. With the arrival of the railway age, these clients enabled Tite to become a well-known figure in the provision of professional architectural and valuation services to railway companies. Like most practices of the time, his office staff was small and he was only able to provide services by delegating or passing on work to other architects and surveyors, and by establishing sub-offices where necessary. Thus, in the 1840s, he had offices of some form in France, Carlisle, Edinburgh and Perth. His busy schedule meant he frequently provided sketches whilst in the midst of site visits, and he therefore relied on his office staff to provide finished drawings. Ultimately, he had a number of partners who carried on his practice for a further generation.

АНГЛИЙСКОЕ АРХИТЕКТУРНОЕ КАПРИЧЧИО В КОНТЕКСТЕ РАЗВИТИЯ ВЕДУЩИХ СТИЛИСТИЧЕСКИХ НАПРАВЛЕНИЙ XIX ВЕКА

Architectural capriccio in the context of the development of the landscape genre, formed in Italy in the 15th – 16th centuries, has gained currency in English art 19th-century. This was facilitated by cultural, historical, political and social reasons. The methodological features of architectural capriccio in the 19th century was influenced by various artistic and art styles in English. The article is devoted to the prerequisites for the formation and dissemination of “capriccio” in the work of English architects and artists: C. Cockerell, J. M. Gandy, T. Cole and others in the cultural and historical context of the 19th century. The article also points out the creative methods and techniques for the formation of the genre of architectural fantasies in the period of changing style canons, the development of eclecticism and romanticism in the art of the 19th century. The causes of reminiscence of Gothic architectural forms in the capriccio genre by English artists of the 19th century are also discussed in detail in that article.

Patrick Keiller and „the problem of London”

British architect and filmmaker Patrick Keiller is the author of the crictially acclaimed Robinson Trilogy (London, Robinson in Space, Robinson in Ruins). Keiller’s unique style of filmmaking intentionally depicts places that are nearly or altogether devoid of human presence and activity. They are sites in which events might take place, and the events are seen rather as possible contemporary myths. Keiller’s film essays explore the notions of place, the production of space, the workings of memory and the feeling of nostalgia. His investigation into the idea of “drifting”, understood as free association in space, reveals Keiller’s fascination with the “built environment” presented in an innovate filmic way, combining imagery, sound and editing. The paper concentrates on the first part of his trilogy, where the author addresses the “problem of London”.

On Margins: Feminist Architectural Histories of Migration

“A Future Architect?” pencil on paper drawing by S.M. Pithawalla, and “Women Should Not Become Architects!” remarks by G.B. Kahirasagar to the Sir J.J. College of Art School of Architecture Literary and Debating Society. These remarks opened a discussion with Perin Mistri, “our only lady student of Architecture.” Mistri became licensed by the Royal Institute of British Architects (riba) and practiced in Bombay for several years, as a principal in an architectural firm and the Secretary of th...

‘Global modernity’ in China and France: Flattening boundaries between Foreign Brandscapes & Regional Urban Heritage

This paper studies transnational architecture and ‘global modernity’ through the reading of two photographs of foreign, iconic buildings in China and France. The first photograph by Hufton + Crow (2012) is of the Galaxy SOHO in Beijing by the Iraqi-born, British architect, Zaha Hadid Architect (ZHA) in collaboration with the state-ownedChineseBIAD(BeijingInstituteofArchitectureandDesign).Thelandmark, futurist ZHA building looks to have gobbled up the local urban heritage around it. The second photograph by Marc Petitjean taken in 1975 is of the Pompidou Centre in Paris under-construction and was designed by Richard Rogers and Renzo Piano with Gianfranco Franchini. In front of the Pompidou Centre is Gordon Matta-Clark’s Conical Intersect (1975) contained within a row of soon-to-be-demolished 17th century townhouses. Both the Galaxy SOHO and the Centre Pompidou are examples of transnational architecture where foreign architects crossing new global market frontiers, design landmark buildings at the expense of local heritage. They show how the rise in image culture tied to capitalism–through global branding and brand scapes – and promoted by ‘governmentality’ nurtures a culture of producing and consuming foreign architecture to redefine the image of nation state. The paper discusses how globalisation ‘flattens’ regionalism for modernisation. Foreign architects working on transnational architecture and their clients have an ethical responsibility to resist ‘cultural [architectural] imperialism’ (including the visual allure of the West as the alpha culture) and should instead engage deeply with regional and domestic urban values, typologies, scales and traditions to be critical of global capitalism.

A TALE OF TWO CHURCHES: ‘PROTESTANT’ ARCHITECTURE AND THE POLITICS OF RELIGION IN LATE NINETEENTH-CENTURY ROME

The two Anglican churches in Rome by the distinguished nineteenth-century English architect George Edmund Street — St Paul's Within-the-Walls (1872–6), Via Nazionale, and All Saints’ (1880–7), Via del Babuino — are notable examples of High Victorian design. Yet little scholarly attention has been afforded either church, especially All Saints’. This article considers both these buildings not so much as works of architecture but as markers of cultural intent in an environment (and age) fraught with political and religious tension and conflict. It seeks to understand them in the difficult and often fluid context of Risorgimento Italy out of which they emerged, including the city of Rome immediately following its capture by Italian national forces on 20 September 1870. The aim is to establish an interpretation of the two buildings that pays due attention to their political and religious agency. In so doing this article considers closely how architecture was understood as a mediating force in the struggle over politics and identity in the late nineteenth century. In taking a fresh look at the extant archival documentation, alternative possibilities are offered (and revealed) as to how we might further decode the significance of these beguiling if still largely misunderstood works of architecture.

International accreditation of architecture programs promoting competitiveness in professional practice

The study addresses the subject of international accreditation programs of architecture education and professional practice, as there is a strong relationship through the program's contents and its learning outcomes. The research starts with an overview of the accreditation organizations for architecture programs, The National Architectural Accrediting Board, Inc. (NAAB) in the United States and the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) in the United Kingdom, and the number of accredited and validated architecture programs in the Arab countries. Also, the main SPC's and Criteria for both NAAB and RIBA, and its levels, to be accomplished have been reviewed.As a case study, five architecture programs, equivalent or substantially equivalent by NAAB, have been selected, representing colleges and departments of architecture in the Middle East and the Gulf Area, comparing their courses and credit hours percentages.To accomplish NAAB or RIBA learning outcomes, an SPC's (Student Performance Criteria) are cross reviewed) to reveal the criteria for each course, besides, the documentation for courses' portfolios.In conclusion, the study summarized the importance of accreditation as a tool of continuous assessment for architecture programs to foster competitiveness in professional practice.

Design in a changing world: MacDonald Gill’s large-scale decorative North Atlantic Map in the Queen Mary’s 1st class dining saloon, 1936

British architect, commercial artist, mural painter, and lettering designer MacDonald Gill (1884-1947) is regarded as one of the leading British graphic designers of the early 20th century but, after a period of comparative neglect, has re-emerged a century later as a major figure in British graphic design history. Well known to many millions of viewers in the earlier decades of the 20th century, his visually sumptuous and striking poster work was widely experienced in Britain through his Wonderground Map of London Town (1914) [Figure 1], an above the surface pictorial map covering the geographical spread of the London Underground system. Other MacDonald Gill work was known all around the world through posters and other publicity for Britain’s Empire Marketing Board (EMB, 1926-1933) and other state organisations; at its height, the British Empire covered about 25% of the world’s land surface. He was also widely commissioned for mural paintings including the imposing large-scale pictorial map of the North Atlantic for the First Class Dining Room of the celebrated Cunard Ocean transatlantic ocean liner, the RMS Queen Mary, whose maiden voyage took place in 1936. It is this large-scale visualisation of the North Atlantic Map of the sea voyage between the two capital cities of London and New York, epitomising what were in essence seen as representative of the old and the new worlds, that provides the major focus of this article.

Scottish architects, imperial identities and India’s built environment in the early twentieth century: the careers of John Begg and George Wittet

Two Scottish architects, John Begg and George Wittet, created some of the most famous of Mumbai’s landmarks and notable buildings elsewhere in India in the early twentieth century. They were also instrumental in the development of architectural education in India through their involvement with the Sir Jamshetji Jeejeebhoy School of Art. Both men made major contributions to the colonial built environment as well as to the future of the architectural profession in India. In this regard, they are highly significant but under-studied Scottish participants in the history of the British Empire. Scottish architects and their role in the shaping of imperial cities around the world have remained largely absent from much of the rich history of Scotland and empire. This article uses the examples of Begg and Wittet to analyse the career trajectories of these two Scottish architects. Through close analysis of Begg’s numerous writings, it becomes clear that in the professional sphere, Begg sought to champion the notable minority of trained British architects serving in India, and to bring their work to the attention of the metropole. In this regard, their professional identity was that of the British imperial architect, while they simultaneously maintained Scottish social and religious connections. Like many Scots before them, they forged fluid Scottish, British, and imperial identities while serving in India.

Designing the Child’s World: Ernö Goldfinger and the Role of the Architect, 1933–1946

Abstract Before Hungarian-born British architect Ernö Goldfinger became known for designing large-scale urban housing and office developments, he built a reputation designing toys, furnishings, interiors and exhibitions for and about children. Focussing on these projects, this article investigates how the architect sought to create a lasting audience for modern architecture by teaching children how to navigate the world independently. By looking at these projects, it is also possible to see how Goldfinger, and other architects, have bridged disciplinary categories by encompassing aspects of industrial, interior, urban and graphic design as part of a broad definition of architecture.