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Designing Britain: Is Charles in charge?
Britain's leading architect cries constitutional crisis as the Prince quashes his plans for a modern neighbourhood
Doug Saunders
London — From Wednesday's Globe and Mail, Wednesday, Jun. 17, 2009 09:16AM EDT
Lord Richard Rogers is the architect who brightened Europe's cities with such landmarks as the Lloyd's Building and the Millennium Dome in London, the Pompidou Centre in Paris and the new Madrid airport terminal. Until this week, he was to design London's newest and greenest housing project.
Prince Charles is the son of Britain's head of state. He is a sworn enemy of contemporary architecture, the head and founder of an architectural organization and a man known for sending long, handwritten letters to cabinet ministers and fellow monarchs in order to get his way.
When this unstoppable force of architecture and urban planning collided with this immovable face of hereditary rule this week, something resembling a constitutional crisis exploded over London.
It was revealed Tuesday that Lord Rogers, who has spent 21/2-years designing a $6-billion neighbourhood of condominiums and affordable-housing apartments on the site of the Chelsea Barracks in West London, had been booted off the project after the Prince lobbied Sheik Hamad bin Jaber Jassim al-Thani, the project's financier and a member of the Qatari royal family.
The Prince, furthermore, has suggested that his housing organization and his favoured architect design the project themselves in the conservative, neo-Georgian style he has had built all over Britain, described as “dreary†and “kitschy†by architecture critics.
This has provoked Lord Rogers to level charges that the Prince has overstepped his constitutional bounds by meddling in political affairs.
“I think there is a dangerous precedent which the Prince has entered into,†he said Tuesday. “In my opinion, anyone who uses his power due to birth breaks a constitutional understanding and a trust we have within our society about the role of people who received power in that manner.â€
He called for a parliamentary inquiry into the Prince's use of his hereditary powers to impose his tastes – and, increasingly often, his own financially successful organizations – on the public projects of Britain.
It is not an idle threat from an architect who is highly respected at the top levels of government. Lord Rogers was appointed to oversee design for the 2012 London Olympic Games, and was chairman in the 1990s of Prime Minister Tony Blair's urban taskforce, which replaced the country's ugly public-housing projects with more neighbourly, humane and ecological structures.
Politicians have become increasingly worried about Prince Charles's attempts to influence legislation on subjects as diverse as agriculture policy, vaccination and medical policy in recent years; many complain privately about “black spider†lobbying letters they receive from the prince, in his characteristic looping handwriting.
Former housing minister Nick Raynsford was one of several politicians to issue direct threats Tuesday to the monarchy.
“It is not sensible in the long-term interests of the monarchy for members of the Royal Family to be engaged in an almost feudal way in discussions with members of royal families overseas about outcomes that should be determined by the normal democratic process,†the MP said in a statement.
It is the height of a 25-year battle between the Prince and the architect, one that has reshaped the appearance of Britain's cities and towns.
It was almost exactly 25 years ago, in 1983, that a much younger Prince of Wales surprised his country by giving a blistering speech that denounced the architecture of the time. He focused on a planned extension to London's National Gallery, calling it a “carbuncle†and calling for a neoclassical design.
The designer of that extension was Richard Rogers. As a result of the Prince's plan, it too was scrapped at the 11th hour, the first of at least four of his designs to be scuppered by the Prince.
In the 1980s, modern architecture was unpopular among Britons, after cheap housing projects in the postwar years and windowless poured-concrete styles led to a profusion of bland, crumbling cubes.
So the Prince's original speech proved popular with the politicians of the day, and inspired a following. His organization, the Prince's Foundation for the Built Environment, was hired to design houses, neighbourhoods and entire towns in traditional styles.
But by the 1990s, the mood had changed. With more money spent on buildings and the world's leading architectural minds flooding into London, the country's urban skylines began to fill with exciting new buildings and the public fell in love with such structures as Norman Foster's Gherkin, Birmingham's Selfridge's building and Newcastle's dramatic Quayside development.
In that atmosphere, the Prince's proclamations began sounding anachronistic and bizarre, as he lashed out against increasingly popular and well-liked designs.
His views also seemed to present a conflict of interest. While the Prince's foundations, including his architecture foundation, are officially non-profit or charitable, they pay high salaries, including a total of $32-million to the Prince himself last year, up from $24-million in 2005.
After the Prince succeeded in killing the project this weekend, Lord Rogers reacted with fury.
“Are we going to have royalty dictating to us on modern art? Are we going to have royalty dictating our taste in music? Are we going to have royalty dictating their taste in medicine, modern or not,†he said Tuesday, in a veiled reference to the prince's political advocacy of homeopathic cures.
“No, they're not experts in those fields, but more important still it's not constitutional for them to enter into fields which are political, where they're prtected and we're not protected.â€
Designing Britain: Is Charles in charge?
Britain's leading architect cries constitutional crisis as the Prince quashes his plans for a modern neighbourhood
Doug Saunders
London — From Wednesday's Globe and Mail, Wednesday, Jun. 17, 2009 09:16AM EDT
Lord Richard Rogers is the architect who brightened Europe's cities with such landmarks as the Lloyd's Building and the Millennium Dome in London, the Pompidou Centre in Paris and the new Madrid airport terminal. Until this week, he was to design London's newest and greenest housing project.
Prince Charles is the son of Britain's head of state. He is a sworn enemy of contemporary architecture, the head and founder of an architectural organization and a man known for sending long, handwritten letters to cabinet ministers and fellow monarchs in order to get his way.
When this unstoppable force of architecture and urban planning collided with this immovable face of hereditary rule this week, something resembling a constitutional crisis exploded over London.
It was revealed Tuesday that Lord Rogers, who has spent 21/2-years designing a $6-billion neighbourhood of condominiums and affordable-housing apartments on the site of the Chelsea Barracks in West London, had been booted off the project after the Prince lobbied Sheik Hamad bin Jaber Jassim al-Thani, the project's financier and a member of the Qatari royal family.
The Prince, furthermore, has suggested that his housing organization and his favoured architect design the project themselves in the conservative, neo-Georgian style he has had built all over Britain, described as “dreary†and “kitschy†by architecture critics.
This has provoked Lord Rogers to level charges that the Prince has overstepped his constitutional bounds by meddling in political affairs.
“I think there is a dangerous precedent which the Prince has entered into,†he said Tuesday. “In my opinion, anyone who uses his power due to birth breaks a constitutional understanding and a trust we have within our society about the role of people who received power in that manner.â€
He called for a parliamentary inquiry into the Prince's use of his hereditary powers to impose his tastes – and, increasingly often, his own financially successful organizations – on the public projects of Britain.
It is not an idle threat from an architect who is highly respected at the top levels of government. Lord Rogers was appointed to oversee design for the 2012 London Olympic Games, and was chairman in the 1990s of Prime Minister Tony Blair's urban taskforce, which replaced the country's ugly public-housing projects with more neighbourly, humane and ecological structures.
Politicians have become increasingly worried about Prince Charles's attempts to influence legislation on subjects as diverse as agriculture policy, vaccination and medical policy in recent years; many complain privately about “black spider†lobbying letters they receive from the prince, in his characteristic looping handwriting.
Former housing minister Nick Raynsford was one of several politicians to issue direct threats Tuesday to the monarchy.
“It is not sensible in the long-term interests of the monarchy for members of the Royal Family to be engaged in an almost feudal way in discussions with members of royal families overseas about outcomes that should be determined by the normal democratic process,†the MP said in a statement.
It is the height of a 25-year battle between the Prince and the architect, one that has reshaped the appearance of Britain's cities and towns.
It was almost exactly 25 years ago, in 1983, that a much younger Prince of Wales surprised his country by giving a blistering speech that denounced the architecture of the time. He focused on a planned extension to London's National Gallery, calling it a “carbuncle†and calling for a neoclassical design.
The designer of that extension was Richard Rogers. As a result of the Prince's plan, it too was scrapped at the 11th hour, the first of at least four of his designs to be scuppered by the Prince.
In the 1980s, modern architecture was unpopular among Britons, after cheap housing projects in the postwar years and windowless poured-concrete styles led to a profusion of bland, crumbling cubes.
So the Prince's original speech proved popular with the politicians of the day, and inspired a following. His organization, the Prince's Foundation for the Built Environment, was hired to design houses, neighbourhoods and entire towns in traditional styles.
But by the 1990s, the mood had changed. With more money spent on buildings and the world's leading architectural minds flooding into London, the country's urban skylines began to fill with exciting new buildings and the public fell in love with such structures as Norman Foster's Gherkin, Birmingham's Selfridge's building and Newcastle's dramatic Quayside development.
In that atmosphere, the Prince's proclamations began sounding anachronistic and bizarre, as he lashed out against increasingly popular and well-liked designs.
His views also seemed to present a conflict of interest. While the Prince's foundations, including his architecture foundation, are officially non-profit or charitable, they pay high salaries, including a total of $32-million to the Prince himself last year, up from $24-million in 2005.
After the Prince succeeded in killing the project this weekend, Lord Rogers reacted with fury.
“Are we going to have royalty dictating to us on modern art? Are we going to have royalty dictating our taste in music? Are we going to have royalty dictating their taste in medicine, modern or not,†he said Tuesday, in a veiled reference to the prince's political advocacy of homeopathic cures.
“No, they're not experts in those fields, but more important still it's not constitutional for them to enter into fields which are political, where they're prtected and we're not protected.â€