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MANILA, Philippines - Who is the 20th century British architect known for his buildings in Britain, Africa, and India?
He was born in Chesire on August 2, 1899. After serving in World War I, he received an ex-serviceman’s grant that enabled him to enter Liverpool University’s School of Architecture in 1920, where he was trained in the Suave neo-Georgian classicism of his mentors.
The curriculum of the course included town planning as an important component, and he retained an interest in planning throughout his career.
After earning his diploma in 1923, he worked for a short time in New York before returning to England to join the office of Thomas Addams and F. Longstreth Thompson, specialists in town planning.
His next post was chief assistant in the architect’s department of the Southern Railway, where he was architect of three neo classically styled railway stations at Margate, Ramsgate, and Dumpton Park.
It was during this time that the change in his aesthetic views came gradually. Frustrated at the prevailing conservatism of British architecture and society, he found that the “austere formalism and social idealism†of continental modernism appealed to is moral outlook and his desire for social change.
His so-called conversion to modernism was influenced by his membership in continental European groups, and his involvement in the English branch, the Modern Architecture Research Group (MARS).
He was one of the few modernist architects working in Britain in the 1930s that were British: most were immigrants from continental Europe where modernism originated.
His well-known works during his time include Sun House, Forgnal Lane, Hampstead, Miramonte in Surrey, and Kensal House in London, where he worked with the pioneering social reformer Elizabeth Denby to create a spacious estate with modern shared amenities and set new standards for its time.
From 1937 to 1942, he worked as secretary of the governing committee of the MARS group plan for the redevelopment of postwar London, the results of which were outlined in his 1944 work Fine Building. In 1939, he became a fellow of the Royal Institute of Architects.
In 1942, he married the architect Jane Drew, who shared his zeal for architectural and social modernization, and they became professional as well as personal partners. Their first work together was for the British government in its West African colonies where he was appointed town planning adviser to Lord Swinton, the resident minister of British West Africa.
Although based in London, much of their work for the next few years continued in West Africa for the British colonial authorities. They also worked in Ghana and Nigeria, primarily on educational establishments, notably the University of Ibadam.
In 1951, they joined an ambitious project to create the new city of Chandigarh from scratch. With the partition of India, the Indian part of Punjab needed a new capital, and together with a team of architects, including Le Corbusier, they spent three years designing housing, a hospital, colleges, a health center, swimming pools, and shops.
He was also a painter, writer, and poet, and exhibited at the Royal Academy’s Summer Exhibition, and had one-man shows.
He served on the Royal Institute of British Architects, and was awarded the institute’s Royal Gold Medal in 1964. He also served on the Royal Fine Arts Commission and the council of the Royal Society of Arts. He was appointed CBE in 1956 and an honorary fellow of the American Institute of Architects of America. Towards the end of this life, he became professor of architecture at the Royal Academy.
He died in 1987 at the age of 88.
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Last week’s question: Who is the Spanish celebrity chef whose Mugaritz restaurant has been described as “the most important gastronomic phenomenon on the world scene in recent times†by the international gastronomic press?
Answer: Andoni Luis Aduriz
Winner: Marcela Uy Ong of Sta. Cruz, Manila
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Text your answer to 0915-6486414 with your name and address. One winner will be chosen through a raffle of texts with the correct answer. The winner will receive P2,000 worth of SM gift certificates for use at Our Home, SM Department Store, or SM Supermarket. They can claim their prize at Our Home in SM Megamall. Call the store manager at 634-1943. Bring photocopies of two valid IDs and a clipping of the Design Quiz issue in which you appear as winner.
