They can't all be winners, but we need bold urban design

Last week, the Guardian held a masterclass event in London on Writing for Cities which featured speakers Oliver Wainwright and Owen Hatherley, professional critics of architecture and the built environment.

While the event was geared predominantly towards amateur or up-and-coming writers and bloggers (who live and work in London), there was also plenty for those of us who work in the regional property PR sector.

Wainwright’s presentation in particular was an interesting insight into the thought processes and approach of a professional critic of architecture and urban design, particularly in terms of the developments that he felt reflected the lackadaisical attitude of many city planners.

This was represented by a slide showing a full two-page article written by Wainwright from an April 2014 edition of the Guardian.

Entitled ‘Horror Storeys: the 10 worst London skyscrapers’, the piece (which can be found here) outlines various designs that Wainwright scathingly brands as a ‘shiny blue cucumber’, ‘a stack of hard drives’ and ‘two oversized air ducts’.

Supposedly representing the very worst that the city has to offer, the article is the author’s personal portfolio of the grotesque, outlandish and undesirable examples of urban development to be found in London.

Vauxhall Tower: tall

I didn’t – and still don’t – agree with all of Wainwright’s selections: the 50-floor Vauxhall Tower (“liked a cigarette stubbed out by the Thames”) and Stratford Halo (“wrapped with dubious purple pinstripes and topped with a jaunty quiff”) are at least to me, not aesthetically unappealing.

And there’s the crux of the issue: design is always subjective. What I consider to be an epic monstrosity, the person standing next to me may see as the epitome of utopian splendour.

This is surely the great thing about the ongoing evolution of our cities; after all, shouldn’t it be the remit of architects – as with all artists – to push the boundaries of their craft and inspire debate and discussion through their designs?

Exterior of the Selfridges part of the Bullring

In Birmingham some of our most instantly recognisable, widely appreciated and now greatly loved buildings have come in the form of extravagant and unusual design. The mosaic of silver disks that form the façade of the Selfridges section of the Bullring, for example, is such an instantly recognisable feature of the Birmingham skyline that it is now visual shorthand for the city.

Likewise, the Cube is a fine example of a building that remains unfettered by the restrictions of an unimaginative mind and while it generated considerable debate when it was announced, it has now slotted into the city’s skyline like a cube-shaped peg into a cube-shaped hole.

Other examples of where the city has dared to roll the dice on a design include the new Library of Birmingham with its gilded fez of a rotunda perched on top of its stacked design, and Bournville College out at Longbridge, both fantastic and unusual additions to the city.

The plans that we’ve seen released this week for the delivery of the building to replace the brutalist almost window-free 103 Colmore Row on the corner of Newhall Street are also exciting, offering a contemporary soaring tower that will sit well amongst its classic cohorts in the Central Business District.

Admittedly, not every design that pushes the boundaries is a winner and dipping back into Wainwright’s article he and I clearly agree on the Odalisk hotel and serviced apartment scheme in Croydon, with its schizophrenic cut-and-paste facade. Ugh.

Clearly there is more at play here than just the aesthetic of a building: it needs to be considered within its wider context, how it impacts on existing buildings, its functionality and whether it is fit for purpose. But for the most part, the complaints and comments that we see raised from planning officers, bloggers and members of the public focus firmly on the façade. After all, that’s what you’re going to be looking at.

Interim public realm proposed post-demolition of 103 Colmore Row

It should be noted that Wainwright has also written a piece outlining what he feels are London’s 10 best high-rise additions to the skyline. As with its counterpart, there were a few inclusions in the list that resulted in a raised eyebrow, not least the Trellick Tower, a 31 floor residential building completed in 1972 that rears over the “prim terraced streets of Notting Hill”.

Praised for its clever design of arranging its 200 flats into a series of stacked ‘streets’, it reminded me instantly of an offcut from the Park Hill estate in Sheffield.

This stretch of concrete-and-brick squats on top of one of the city’s many hills, dominating the skyline above the city’s train station and my memories of my time at university in the city.

It just goes to show quite how subjective the matter is.

This blog originally appeared on the Core Marketing website.