Stuart King – författare

Our world is full of lands, cities, buildings and artefacts, many of which are deposits and residues of colonial times and, more pervasively, colonial processes. Reclaiming Colonial Architecture unpacks the built inheritances of colonialism and re-thinks how we might understand, narrate, intervene in or act upon them as architects.

Offering historical background, unpacking key concepts and presenting thematically organised and multi-scalar urban and architectural case studies, this accessible publication showcases how legacies of colonialism are being dealt with in real-world instances. Case studies involve works and actions by built environment professionals such as architects and heritage practitioners, as well as community initiatives and activism.

The book aims to build confidence in practitioners, students and communities grappling with a seemingly vast and complex terrain of debates and approaches around colonial landscapes, urban areas, buildings, monuments and material culture. It also aims to be a helpful resource for architecture schools or critical heritage studies departments and organisations. Its content will provide a point of departure for graduate student inquiry and its accessible nature will help introduce undergraduate students to the concepts and questions of colonial built-environments.

Our world is full of lands, cities, buildings and artefacts, many of which are deposits and residues of colonial times and, more pervasively, colonial processes. Reclaiming Colonial Architecture unpacks the built inheritances of colonialism and re-thinks how we might understand, narrate, intervene in or act upon them as architects.

Offering historical background, unpacking key concepts and presenting thematically organised and multi-scalar urban and architectural case studies, this accessible publication showcases how legacies of colonialism are being dealt with in real-world instances. Case studies involve works and actions by built environment professionals such as architects and heritage practitioners, as well as community initiatives and activism.

The book aims to build confidence in practitioners, students and communities grappling with a seemingly vast and complex terrain of debates and approaches around colonial landscapes, urban areas, buildings, monuments and material culture. It also aims to be a helpful resource for architecture schools or critical heritage studies departments and organisations. Its content will provide a point of departure for graduate student inquiry and its accessible nature will help introduce undergraduate students to the concepts and questions of colonial built-environments.

Brutalism had its origins in béton brut – concrete in the raw – and thus in the post-war work of Le Corbusier. The British architects Alison and Peter Smithson used the term "New Brutalism" from 1953, claiming that if their house in Soho had been built, "it would have been the first exponent of the ‘New Brutalism’ in England". Reyner Banham famously gave the movement a series of characteristics, including the clear expression of a building’s structure and services, and the honest use of materials in their "as-found" condition. The Smithsons and Banham promoted the New Brutalism as ethic rather than aesthetic, privileging truth to structure, materials and services and the gritty reality of the working classes over the concerns of the bourgeoisie. But Brutalist architecture changed as it was taken up by others, giving rise to more sculptural buildings flaunting their raw materials, including off-form concrete, often in conjunction with bold structural members. While Brutalism fell out of vogue in the 1980s, recent years have seen renewed admiration for it. This volume is consistent with this broader resurgence, presenting new scholarship on Brutalist architects and projects from Skopje to Sydney, and from Harvard to Haringey. It will appeal to readers interested in twentieth-century architecture, and modern and post-war heritage. This book was originally published as a special issue of Fabrications: the Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand.

Brutalism had its origins in béton brut – concrete in the raw – and thus in the post-war work of Le Corbusier. The British architects Alison and Peter Smithson used the term "New Brutalism" from 1953, claiming that if their house in Soho had been built, "it would have been the first exponent of the ‘New Brutalism’ in England". Reyner Banham famously gave the movement a series of characteristics, including the clear expression of a building’s structure and services, and the honest use of materials in their "as-found" condition. The Smithsons and Banham promoted the New Brutalism as ethic rather than aesthetic, privileging truth to structure, materials and services and the gritty reality of the working classes over the concerns of the bourgeoisie. But Brutalist architecture changed as it was taken up by others, giving rise to more sculptural buildings flaunting their raw materials, including off-form concrete, often in conjunction with bold structural members. While Brutalism fell out of vogue in the 1980s, recent years have seen renewed admiration for it. This volume is consistent with this broader resurgence, presenting new scholarship on Brutalist architects and projects from Skopje to Sydney, and from Harvard to Haringey. It will appeal to readers interested in twentieth-century architecture, and modern and post-war heritage. This book was originally published as a special issue of Fabrications: the Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand.