British high-tech architecture


British high-tech architecture is a form of high-tech architecture, also known as structural expressionism, a type of late modern architectural style that emerged in the 1970s, incorporating elements of high tech industry and technology into building design. High-tech architecture grew from the modernist style, using new advances in technology and building materials.

Clarification

British high-tech architecture is a term applied principally to the work of a group of London-based architects, British High-Tech Architects, who, by following the teachings of the Architectural Association's futuristic programmes, created an architectural style best characterised by cultural and design ideals of: component-based, light weight, easily transportable, factory-finished using standardised interchangeable highly engineered parts, fun, popular and spontaneous Pop-up buildings.
Within the Architectural Association were a number of overlapping spheres of influence – the most notable being Archigram, a loosely arranged group including Peter Cook, Mike Webb and Ron Herron. Alongside Archigram were the mechanistic schemes of Cedric Price, who, with engineer Frank Newby, designed a number of unbuilt projects, most notably Fun Palace, a community theatre to the brief of Joan Littlewood, and Potteries Think-belt, a scheme which would re-use decommissioned railway routes to create a university on wheels. Price also promoted the idea of architecture having a fourth dimension: Time. In addition to the aforementioned was the Independent Group, which influenced the British side of the pop art movement, through architectural luminaries Peter Smithson a Head of the Architectural Association and Colin St John Wilson.
The British high-tech movement remained in the ascendency from the 1960s until 1984, when an intervention by HRH Charles Prince of Wales over a competition-winning design by ABK Architects for an extension to the National Gallery in London signalled an end to High Tech architecture in the UK. More, from that date, the group of leading proponents of British High Tech architecture distanced themselves from the High Tech style to endear themselves to sponsors. By such action, they would continue to design buildings of national and international significance. In satisfying the demands of conservative clients, planners, conservationists and funding organisations, the essence of High Tech was lost.
This article, British high-tech architecture, traces the development of technological advances and industrial innovations that went hand-in-hand with the emergence of the High Tech style, and without which British high-tech architecture would have remained where it started – as the pop art imagery of Archigram, the most influential of the Architectural Association visionary groups.

Background

The history of light-weight, mass-produced, component-based dry construction, which, as a means of assembly differentiates system building from traditional building methods, dates back to the 19th C. It started in the UK with Sir Joseph Paxton's newly created building methods at Chatsworth House's conservatory completed in 1840, and later at The Great Exhibition of 1851, when he used steam-powered woodworking machines to manufacture batches of identical components. At the same time, Henry Robinson Palmer patented corrugated iron, using his invention to construct a shed roof for the London Dock Company the following year.
Progress continued in another industry entirely, the lattice framed trusses required for airships developed by Barnes Wallis at Howden, Yorkshire during his work in the 1920s on the R100 Airship resulted in the development of light weight tubes made from spiral-wound duralumin strip in a helical fashion.
Later, solutions to housing shortage and replacement of other war-decimated facilities required fresh thinking about factory rather than site based building, such as the post-war building of Arcon prefabs in the United Kingdom in large numbers, and of system-built schools such as Consortium of Local Authorities Special Programme CLASP, filtered through to building design in the form of High Tech System Building. Generally, it has been an engineering innovation that has given rise to architectural opportunity.
Between 1961 and 1967 in California, the SCSD project offered architects and educationalists more options than had been available previously - providing greater column-free floor space by using longer spans, and flexible room layouts below. A deep structural zone into which power, H&V, lighting and concertina partition tracks could be accommodated reduced the need for the rigid restrictive planning grids that had hampered the earlier systems.
Further innovations: space frame roof structures derived from WWII aircraft hangar roofs, Rectangular Hollow Section steel, known in the US as Hollow Structural Section developed in the UK by Stewarts & Lloyds Ltd in the late 1950s and early 1960s, and advances in 'Patent Glazing' during the same period of time, which allowed greater freedom in both wall and roof glazing – presented architects and their clients with near-unlimited flexibility in a building's planning, layout of accommodation and use patterns.
The trend for light weight dry construction also had its roots in military fast-response use, when administration, storage or workshop buildings might be required at short notice. The Nissen hut from WWI, and later the Quonset hut developed during WWII were both produced in large quantities. However, notwithstanding its origins for military use, light weight design principles were seized upon by American architect and philosopher Richard Buckminster Fuller, who advocated the use of slender or tensile structural components as they would be less wasteful of Earth's scarce resources than would be their bulkier traditional counterparts. His message became something of a creed for the generation of High tech architects. Fuller's designs used well-engineered batch produced components in designs for his renowned Geodesic Domes, although the term 'geodesic' is attributed to Barnes Wallis in his fuselage design for the WWII Lancaster bomber aircraft. German-born Konrad Wachsmann also taught the principles of this type of component-based building design at USC School of Architecture-SAFA.

Proponents of British high-tech architecture

Most architects associated with British high-tech emerged from the Architectural Association; others worked in London at the offices of those that had. Some, like-minded, had come through the offices of modernists such as Ove Arup and Felix Samuely, who believed in 'total design' an earlier term for 'multi-disciplinary' design. In addition, a small group of sympathetic structural engineers, including Frank Newby, Anthony Hunt, Ted Happold, Mark Whitby and Peter Rice, became essential to the development of the movement. As a result of the symbiotic association between architects and engineers, a freedom of design evolved away from the constraints of the everyday. Aside from the architectural and engineering impetus, there was a wider cultural involvement as the principal proponents shared friendships centred upon art, writing and industrial design. Most operated as freelancers working in small studio home offices which became their calling-cards identifying with the High Tech style.
  • Michael Aukett
  • Reyner Banham Writer and critic
  • John Batchelor Technical Illustrator – aircraft and other – Subjects include work by Foster
  • Misha Black Contributor to patronage of 1951 Festival of Britain and to Design Research Unit
  • Hugh Broughton Formed Hugh Broughton Architects in 1995
  • Cuno Brullmann Worked in association with Piano + Rogers and Ove Arup and Partners
  • Marcus Brumwell, a founder of Design Research Unit
  • Richard Buckminster Fuller
  • Hugh Casson Director of Architecture for the 1951 Festival of Britain
  • Warren Chalk Founding member of Archigram
  • Peter Cook founding member of Archigram
  • Dennis Crompton founding member and archivist of Archigram
  • Charles and Ray Eames
  • Ezra Ehrenkrantz architect of the SCSD project
  • Norman Foster co-founder of Team 4
  • Wendy Foster co-founder of Team 4
  • David Greene Founding member of Archigram
  • Nicholas Grimshaw Grimshaw Architects founded in 1980
  • Fritz Haller USM Modular Furniture
  • Ted Happold Founded Buro Happold in 1976
  • Ron Herron Founding member of Archigram
  • Andrew Holmes
  • Michael Hopkins Former partner at Foster Associates, set up Michael Hopkins Architects in 1976
  • Patty Hopkins Cofounder of Michael Hopkins Architects in 1976, completed Hopkins House, Hampstead in the same year
  • Richard Horden
  • John Howard
  • Anthony Hunt Formed Anthony Hunt Associates in 1962
  • Ben Johnson Subjects include architectural works by Foster and Rogers
  • Jan Kaplický Drawings of Neo futuristic Architecture
  • Ian Liddell
  • Syd Mead Artist specialising in Neo futuristic imagery – subjects include concept work for1982 movie Blade Runner
  • Max Mengeringenhausen, Founder of Mero Structures now named Mero-Schmidlin
  • John Miller Formed partnership with Alan Colquhoun in 1961
  • Hidalgo Moya Formed partnership with Philip Powell in 1948
  • Edric Neel Through Arcon sought better links between architects and industry
  • Brendan Neiland Subjects include architectural works by Grimshaw and Rogers
  • Frank Newby
  • Constant Nieuwenhuys
  • David Nixon Future Systems 1979 founded by Kaplický and Nixon while working at Foster Associates
  • Frei Otto
  • Renzo Piano Formed partnership Piano + Rogers in 1971
  • Jean Prouvé
  • Cedric Price "Unconventional and visionary architect best-known for buildings which never saw the light of day"
  • Peter Rice Joined Ove Arup & Partners in 1956
  • Ian Ritchie Worked for Foster Associates and with Hopkins/Hunt on SSSALU
  • Richard Rogers Co-founder of Team 4 Partnership with Piano before founding Richard Rogers
  • Su Rogers Co-founder of Team 4 Partner in Miller & Colquhoun Architects later John Miller & Partners
  • Walter Segal Pioneer of self-build housing to the Segal self-build method
  • Rod Sheard In 1998 Sheard's firm LOBB Sports Architecture merged with HOK Sport.
  • Alison and Peter Smithson and Pioneers of Industrial Aesthetic
  • Basil Spence Designer of bolt-together pavilion for Festival of Britain
  • Colin Stansfield Smith Hampshire County Architect and Patron
  • Ralph Tubbs Designer of bolt-together pavilion for Festival of Britain
  • Konrad Wachsmann
  • Derek Walker Architect and Patron for Milton Keynes Development Corporation
  • Michael Webb Co-founder of Archigram
  • Mark Whitby Worked, early in his career, for Anthony Hunt Associates and Buro Happold
  • John Winter Writer and critic
  • Georgina Wolton
Noteworthy architectural practices
  • Powell & Moya
  • Howard V Lobb & Partners merged with HOK renamed Populous
  • Building Design Partnership
  • Williamson Faulkner Brown now named FaulknerBrowns Architects
  • Gillinson Barnett & Partners now named Barnett & Partners