THE MONTH: MARCH 2010

24-carat Pei
IM Pei may be 93 next month, but he was on cracking form to receive his Royal Gold Medal in February. Following a citation read by his nominator David Adjaye, Pei related how he had very nearly come to Britain rather than America to practise, having taken Cambridge-regulated architecture exams in China in the 1930s. So why didn’t he?  ‘It was Hollywood,’ he confessed. ‘I wanted the place that had Hollywood. But I’m here now.’ His one UK commission is a garden pavilion, modernist chinoiserie, in Wiltshire for the Keswick merchant-banking family.

Pei joins a list of ultra-distinguished RGMs, starting with CR Cockerell in 1848 and including everyone from Corb to Cullinan. HP

Want to know more?
Visit the special online Royal Gold Medal exhibition at http://is.gd/8zAlA

Return of the mansion block
After years of local protests, redesign and funding delays, the £29m ‘Highbury Gardens’ housing project by Porphyrios Associates has started on site. To be built on a former taxi-garage site on London’s Holloway Road but backing onto posh Highbury, this is an intelligent, high-density scheme of 119 homes that revisits the principle of the mansion block. It is also the first stalled project to be brought back to life by the much-maligned ‘Kickstart’ scheme run by the Homes and Communities Agency (see opposite, top).

The scheme, developed by First Base, includes 57 social-housing units for Southern Housing Group and 62 homes for ‘key workers’, which usually means public-sector employees. The development – which was reduced in scale following local concern – is arranged around a garden courtyard and designed to sustainable homes code level 3. Whether or not you like the trad style, everyone can agree on one thing: if only all Kickstart schemes were of this design quality. HP

CMS gives £3m to Cutty Sark restoration
Looks like the old sea dog is going to have its day, with the announcement that the burned-out remains of the 1869 tea clipper the Cutty Sark, in London’s Greenwich, are to receive £3m of government funds from the Department of Culture, Media & Sport.

The money will make up part of the £25m restoration project, primarily funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund.

Project costs recently soared to £46m, with the shortfall picked up by Greenwich Council, the Greater London Authority and 20,000 members of the public between them.

The ship’s restoration is taking place concurrently with the design of its new visitor centre, which is being built out of the vessel’s dry dock and is designed by architects Grimshaw and Youmeheshe.

The project is expected to be completed in time to be seen by visitors to the London 2012 Olympics. CK

Protestors seek designs for Heathrow Fortress
Hot on the heels of BAA architect Grimshaw’s Clerkenwell shop front being vandalised by anti-airport expansion group ‘Plane Stupid’ – for which the group was duly fined £350 for criminal damage – environmental activist Greenpeace chose St Pancras station’s champagne bar last month to announce the launch of its international competition to design ‘The Heathrow Fortress’, which would be built on land earmarked for the third runway at the airport. The plot is in Sipson village, which is itself earmarked to be demolished to make way for the runway. After buying it last year, Greenpeace distributed its ownership to over 60,000 people across the world, creating a legal headache for any government trying to push ahead with the proposed expansion. Architect Peter Clegg, of Feilden Clegg Bradley, one of the judges, was on hand to put his weight behind the campaign. Excited at the prospect of seeing the design competition entries, declared: ‘We haven’t had a brief like this in the UK for seven centuries’. Other judges are the artist Rachael Whiteread, Neil Thomas of Atelier One and comedian Alistair McGowan. Anyone interested in designing the stronghold, to be submitted as a formal planning application, can download the brief at www.greenpeace.org/ heathrowcontest. The deadline for submissions is 23 April. CK

Buildings for life dead in the water?
The Homes & Communities Agency has refused to reveal details of the housing schemes helped by its £1bn Kickstart stimulus programme, amid growing disquiet over the quality of some of the projects funded by it.

HCA chief executive Bob Kerslake has said that it would be a ‘breach of trust’ to release the names of schemes and their scores under the Building for Life quality standard. However, it has already emerged that 27 of the 136 first round schemes had scored five or less out of 20, with two scoring only 1.5. Cabe, which assessed the schemes, has also refused to reveal details.

Shadow housing minister Grant Shapps has tabled two parliamentary questions on Kickstart and design quality.

He is among those supporting a petition by Building Design trying to get the HCA to publish information relating to projects in the £360m first round of Kickstart.

Meanwhile, a further 265 projects have been shortlisted for the £550m second round of the stimulus programme. The RIBA has urged the HCA to improve design quality in the next tranche. PB

Vitrahaus and home
Herzog and de Meuron is the latest in a line of illustrious architects to design for the Vitra factory campus at Weil am Rhein in Germany. To launch its ‘Home Collection’, Vitra commissioned H&dM to build a home, which turned out to be number of them, interconnected and stacked five storeys high, one upon the other. The architect has scaled up its fascination with the concept of a domestic house and cantilevered it to create a form of meta-domesticity, acting as an iconic entrance to the campus. At 23m high, the Vitra ‘home’ becomes the tallest building on the site, its glazed gable ends giving a view out to the campus and showcasing the products inside. The new building is part of Vitra’s programme to promote its products within the context of architectural research and public awareness of design in general. CK

Olympics spend still more
Buildings aren’t the only things growing apace on the London 2012 Olympic site – so are costs.  An extra £21m will be needed according to the latest DCMS report, which is already allocating an extra £160m in contingency to the Olympic Delivery Agency.

The rising costs reflect a fall in expected land receipts after the games, and the expense of planning and procuring the Olympic Park. The contingency fund has already been used to fund shortfalls in the Athletes’ Village and Media Centre projects.

However the project is still on time and on budget according to Olympics minister Tessa Jowell. It remains within both its £1.25bn contingency and the £9.3bn overall event cost.

Work will accelerate on the site this year, with the Velodrome set to be the first venue to be completed – in early 2011. PB

Muf keeps Venice pavilion under its hat
Designing the British Pavilion at the Venice Biennale can prove something of a poisoned chalice. This year Muf is in the hot seat after beating Fat, the Office for Subversive Architecture and Andrew Freear of Rural Studio to the job.

Muf’s winning concept, entitled Two Way Traffic, explores connections and knowledge exchanges between Venice and Britain and will be located in a 19th century former tearoom. The appointment reflects Muf’s rising stock following the success of its Barking Town Square in east London, which won the The European Prize for Urban Public Space in 2008.

Muf is keeping quiet about its concept but the practice’s quirky approach should help it stand out amid all the razzamatazz, and hopefully fare better than some recent British offerings such as Jeremy Till’s 2006 Echo/City.

The 12th Venice Biennale of Architecture, curated by Kazuyo Sejima of Sanaa, will be open to the public from 29 August-21 November 2010. PB