The pandemic of the last six months, which looks likely to continue, has challenged many modern ways of doing things. Retailers, and restaurant-owners are having to think through their business models as never before, as competitors fall like skittles, while office occupiers are reappraising what the office of the future will be – probably not […]
One of the joys of visiting the Venice Biennale is the number of exhibitions of contemporary art on show in historic buildings that you might not otherwise see, often located down canals you would not normally visit. It is as much an architectural discovery as an exploration of new art. The Gallery Edel Assanti has given […]
Outside in the green landscape of the August sunshine, the atmosphere in Holland Park in Kensington is peaceful and relaxing, with families walking through the gardens and runners jogging along the paths. Inside the Design Museum, you enter another world, a world that is current closed due to coronavirus, the world of pulsing throbbing nightclubs […]
Sprüth Magers in London is one of my favourite galleries with its quirky semi-industrial character (even though it is in Mayfair) from the days when the building was a clothing warehouse/showroom, hence the large windows allowing light to flood in (when they want it) – something galleries generally don’t approve of – and the views […]
It’s a long time since sculptors (usually wearing white smocks and black floppy caps in those old black and white photographs) took up their hammer and chisels to cut out their shapes from a block of white cararra marble. Stone sculptures can now be prepared by computerised cutting while artists adopt a wide variety of […]
As you travel around the countryside deep in Surrey, you don’t expect to find a Turkish Tent perched up on a ridge with extensive views across the countryside, but here it is, a short distance from the Grecian Temple of Bacchus. The Turkish Tent, now reconstructed in robust long-lasting materials as one of the many […]
Cemeteries have recently suffered in terms of their meaning in the modern world. Once the height of social status, many have fallen into decline and have been seen as a financial burden whereas the most forward looking see them for what they are – a unique library of social history and a much-loved green space […]
Gunnersbury Park is a place of contrasts. How many parks have two mansion houses side by side and how many have parts that are smart and newly-restored, and others that are fenced off, boarded up, derelict or recently-destroyed? While there have been previous houses in Gunnersbury Park, located to the north of the M4 […]
For those of you who know the history of Hampton Court Palace, you will know of its reputation for ghosts who wander the dark corridors at night. While we have all been focused on our personal experiences during the recent coronavirus lockdown, have we neglected the spiritual world? Perhaps they have been enjoying their new […]
Home of the great early 20th-century socialite Margaret Grenville, the old Regency house was extensively remodelled in 1906 as a base for her country house parties and filled with her collection of fine paintings, furniture, porcelain and silver. The future George VI and Queen Elizabeth spent part of their honeymoon here in 1923. While the […]
"The many great gardens of the world, of literature and poetry, of painting and music, of religion and architecture, all make the point as clear as possible: The soul cannot thrive in the absence of a garden. If you don't want paradise, you are not human; and if you are not human, you don't have a soul."
(Thomas Moore)
To be an architect means having a wide range of interests - architecture, art and creativity in all its variety of forms, sustainability, science and innovation. The greatest interest is often where these different worlds overlap and collide - that is when something imaginative often occurs that pushes us all forward to another place
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