1 00:00:06,720 --> 00:00:08,840 This is the most successful generation of architects 2 00:00:08,840 --> 00:00:10,480 Britain has yet produced. 3 00:00:15,320 --> 00:00:20,520 Richard Rogers, Norman Foster, Michael Hopkins, Nicholas Grimshaw 4 00:00:20,520 --> 00:00:24,120 and Terry Farrell were all born in the 1930s. 5 00:00:24,120 --> 00:00:26,840 They worked with each other in the '60s and '70s 6 00:00:26,840 --> 00:00:30,080 and were once seen as a new movement, dubbed "High-Tech". 7 00:00:33,720 --> 00:00:36,040 They entered their most productive years 8 00:00:36,040 --> 00:00:38,840 at an age when most people think about retiring. 9 00:00:40,520 --> 00:00:42,320 Once they'd been outsiders. 10 00:00:42,320 --> 00:00:44,440 Now, they were at the heart of power, 11 00:00:44,440 --> 00:00:47,120 with necks on the line when things went wrong. 12 00:00:48,600 --> 00:00:51,840 They've been designing the future for over 50 years. 13 00:00:53,880 --> 00:00:57,760 Now, the world they'd always dreamed of is the world we all live in. 14 00:01:13,520 --> 00:01:15,960 Luck had sometimes played a critical role 15 00:01:15,960 --> 00:01:18,040 in the careers of this generation, 16 00:01:18,040 --> 00:01:19,880 and from November 1994, 17 00:01:19,880 --> 00:01:23,000 it funded a boom time in British architecture. 18 00:01:23,000 --> 00:01:25,720 When Britain's National Lottery was launched, 19 00:01:25,720 --> 00:01:27,680 some of the proceeds were ploughed 20 00:01:27,680 --> 00:01:30,560 into a new generation of big public buildings, 21 00:01:30,560 --> 00:01:34,400 many of them designed to celebrate the impending millennium. 22 00:01:34,400 --> 00:01:37,200 And who was in pole position to design them? 23 00:01:37,200 --> 00:01:38,720 It's you! 24 00:01:40,320 --> 00:01:43,160 It was THEM, British architecture's famous five. 25 00:01:43,160 --> 00:01:47,000 All of them created Lottery-funded landmarks. 26 00:01:48,640 --> 00:01:51,320 Lord Richard Rogers, a man once vilified 27 00:01:51,320 --> 00:01:54,240 for radical buildings like Lloyds of London, 28 00:01:54,240 --> 00:01:56,080 and a lifelong Left-winger, 29 00:01:56,080 --> 00:01:59,280 found himself working directly for a Tory government. 30 00:02:01,240 --> 00:02:05,120 The Greenwich Peninsula, then a forgotten, polluted wasteland, 31 00:02:05,120 --> 00:02:07,000 had been selected as home 32 00:02:07,000 --> 00:02:10,560 for the national celebrations of the year 2000. 33 00:02:10,560 --> 00:02:12,880 The government was going to hold what it called 34 00:02:12,880 --> 00:02:15,360 the "Millennium Experience". 35 00:02:15,360 --> 00:02:18,000 Quite what that meant no-one yet knew, 36 00:02:18,000 --> 00:02:22,920 which made it rather tricky for the architects to design a home for it. 37 00:02:22,920 --> 00:02:24,880 We started with the Conservative party 38 00:02:24,880 --> 00:02:26,840 and they didn't know what they wanted. 39 00:02:26,840 --> 00:02:29,240 'Hesitancy and delay created a great gap,' 40 00:02:29,240 --> 00:02:33,080 which, in the end, meant the whole thing had to be rushed. 41 00:02:33,080 --> 00:02:34,440 The clock was ticking. 42 00:02:34,440 --> 00:02:36,680 We went to several meetings with the politicians 43 00:02:36,680 --> 00:02:38,480 and then, ran out of time. 44 00:02:38,480 --> 00:02:40,920 We had to get on with it because we were stuck 45 00:02:40,920 --> 00:02:43,680 up against the time limit of the turn of the century. 46 00:02:43,680 --> 00:02:46,160 And they said, "Well, you're bright people, 47 00:02:46,160 --> 00:02:48,560 "you're creatives, what shall we do now?" 48 00:02:48,560 --> 00:02:51,360 We proposed a universal cover. 49 00:02:51,360 --> 00:02:55,760 It's big, dirt-cheap, very large, so we can get off and running quickly. 50 00:02:55,760 --> 00:02:59,400 I jokingly say, "We built a big umbrella for them and they could do what they like." 51 00:02:59,400 --> 00:03:03,040 So, we chose the building and the site, the contents fell behind. 52 00:03:13,840 --> 00:03:17,880 Though Richard Rogers is the name that makes the headlines, 53 00:03:17,880 --> 00:03:21,760 since the start of his career, he's collaborated with a close-knit team, 54 00:03:21,760 --> 00:03:24,320 and it was one of his most trusted lieutenants 55 00:03:24,320 --> 00:03:28,160 who led this particular project - Mike Davis. 56 00:03:28,160 --> 00:03:30,680 For this once-in-a-millennium occasion, 57 00:03:30,680 --> 00:03:34,720 the practice indulged in which High-Tech usually avoided - 58 00:03:34,720 --> 00:03:36,920 deliberate, symbolic meaning. 59 00:03:43,560 --> 00:03:45,840 It was deliberately a festive structure 60 00:03:45,840 --> 00:03:48,160 and it's a bit like somebody holding a hands out. 61 00:03:48,160 --> 00:03:49,880 It's like people going, "Yes!" 62 00:03:49,880 --> 00:03:52,520 You know, it's a sort of celebratory gesture. 63 00:03:56,200 --> 00:03:59,120 And as the meridian literally runs across the site, 64 00:03:59,120 --> 00:04:01,800 I saw it as a direct connection to time. 65 00:04:01,800 --> 00:04:05,000 It would be 365m in diameter, 66 00:04:05,000 --> 00:04:08,240 which related to the number of days in the year. 67 00:04:08,240 --> 00:04:13,000 It would have 12 masts - the months, 68 00:04:13,000 --> 00:04:16,920 and it would have 24 scallops - the hours in the day. 69 00:04:20,360 --> 00:04:23,760 There was one small obstacle to the perfect symmetry of this concept - 70 00:04:23,760 --> 00:04:26,600 that bit which looks like a ring pull 71 00:04:26,600 --> 00:04:29,200 on the left-hand side of the plan. 72 00:04:29,200 --> 00:04:32,320 This was a structure which already existed on the site, 73 00:04:32,320 --> 00:04:35,160 which provided ventilation for the Blackwall Tunnel 74 00:04:35,160 --> 00:04:39,920 and had been designed 40 years earlier by Terry Farrell. 75 00:04:39,920 --> 00:04:42,320 Richard Rogers had to make a hole in the top, 76 00:04:42,320 --> 00:04:44,400 which I was very amused by, 77 00:04:44,400 --> 00:04:47,440 because, by then, it had become listed! 78 00:04:50,680 --> 00:04:54,440 When New Labour swept to power in 1997, 79 00:04:54,440 --> 00:04:58,080 many expected the Millennium Experience to be cancelled. 80 00:04:58,080 --> 00:05:02,680 Instead, the architects had to adjust to a new set of clients. 81 00:05:02,680 --> 00:05:07,920 If the Millennium Dome is a success it will never be forgotten. 82 00:05:07,920 --> 00:05:12,280 If it's a failure, WE will never be forgiven. 83 00:05:12,280 --> 00:05:15,680 Afternoon. Hello. Nice to meet you. Nice to see you. 84 00:05:15,680 --> 00:05:19,040 For Rogers, architecture is about how things are made 85 00:05:19,040 --> 00:05:20,640 as well as the end result. 86 00:05:20,640 --> 00:05:23,920 The Dome took the grammar of construction to new heights. 87 00:05:26,760 --> 00:05:30,280 It was a huge-scale operation and dramatic construction, 88 00:05:30,280 --> 00:05:33,240 you're building a spider's web 50m in the air. 89 00:05:34,360 --> 00:05:35,960 We hired 50 expert climbers, 90 00:05:35,960 --> 00:05:38,640 so it wasn't just normal construction people, 91 00:05:38,640 --> 00:05:40,600 these were expert rock climbers. 92 00:05:41,920 --> 00:05:44,280 And it's, basically, a cable net. 93 00:05:44,280 --> 00:05:46,240 So, it's a net that's flat, 94 00:05:46,240 --> 00:05:50,360 you pick it up with 12 masts and you hold on to it. 95 00:06:01,240 --> 00:06:06,200 The Dome is, more accurately, a tent made of Teflon coated fabric. 96 00:06:06,200 --> 00:06:07,640 All the High-Tech generation 97 00:06:07,640 --> 00:06:11,440 had designed smaller scale membrane structures in the past. 98 00:06:11,440 --> 00:06:15,960 And what's there is an engineering triumph, it's the lightest structure 99 00:06:15,960 --> 00:06:18,040 ever built of its size in the world 100 00:06:18,040 --> 00:06:21,480 and the masts, all the fabric, all the cables, everything, 101 00:06:21,480 --> 00:06:24,760 still weighs less than an Olympic swimming pool. 102 00:06:27,160 --> 00:06:29,080 It went up tremendously quickly. 103 00:06:29,080 --> 00:06:32,200 Our part went extremely well and we built it on time 104 00:06:32,200 --> 00:06:34,800 and it was a fantastic experience. 105 00:06:34,800 --> 00:06:37,720 And then, of course, the merde hit the Vent-Axia, 106 00:06:37,720 --> 00:06:39,280 as the French say, 107 00:06:39,280 --> 00:06:43,200 and it became a debacle, relatively rapidly. 108 00:06:46,720 --> 00:06:49,280 The difficulty was what they put in, 109 00:06:49,280 --> 00:06:53,640 which I think wasn't very exciting, and so it got a stinking bad name. 110 00:06:55,960 --> 00:06:57,840 We never did do the contents, 111 00:06:57,840 --> 00:07:00,480 so it was a model of how not to do it. 112 00:07:03,200 --> 00:07:05,560 The Dome was written off by the media 113 00:07:05,560 --> 00:07:09,400 as an expensive white elephant before it had even opened. 114 00:07:09,400 --> 00:07:11,520 People wrote vituperative letters saying, 115 00:07:11,520 --> 00:07:16,840 "How can you spend £759 million on a tent?" 116 00:07:16,840 --> 00:07:21,560 Well, we didn't, we spent 43, which was 7% of the budget. 117 00:07:21,560 --> 00:07:26,240 It's the cheapest building ever built per square foot or metre. 118 00:07:26,240 --> 00:07:29,600 We even gave some money back to the Government. 119 00:07:29,600 --> 00:07:35,920 We were amazingly frustrated by the fact that we weren't able to defend our building. 120 00:07:35,920 --> 00:07:39,800 We were not allowed to say that this is a very cheap, very fast build 121 00:07:39,800 --> 00:07:42,800 cos it tended to denigrate the rest of it. 122 00:07:42,800 --> 00:07:49,160 The other 700 or so million pounds went on the controversial contents. 123 00:07:50,400 --> 00:07:53,320 Come 2001, those were removed, 124 00:07:53,320 --> 00:07:57,120 the Dome was locked up and left empty for years. 125 00:07:58,800 --> 00:08:02,000 The Dome is no more, it's now the O2, 126 00:08:02,000 --> 00:08:05,360 and it's great to see it being used and it's now got, again, 127 00:08:05,360 --> 00:08:08,520 7 million visitors, which is pretty much a world maximum, 128 00:08:08,520 --> 00:08:10,160 going to the structure. 129 00:08:12,480 --> 00:08:15,800 I'm delighted that it proves the point about flexible buildings. 130 00:08:15,800 --> 00:08:18,680 It has been adapted, changed and everything else, and I think, 131 00:08:18,680 --> 00:08:21,880 obviously, from the crowds that are going there, it works very well. 132 00:08:27,760 --> 00:08:31,080 Though the sky-high public profile of this generation of architects 133 00:08:31,080 --> 00:08:35,600 brought more work their way, the risks were now higher too. 134 00:08:35,600 --> 00:08:40,080 Norman Foster also felt the full heat of public scrutiny, 135 00:08:40,080 --> 00:08:43,160 with one of his lottery-funded projects. 136 00:08:44,520 --> 00:08:49,000 I dedicate this bridge as a symbol of the new millennium. 137 00:09:00,880 --> 00:09:06,480 In 1996, this design beat 200 other entrants in a competition. 138 00:09:08,000 --> 00:09:09,600 Not for the first time, 139 00:09:09,600 --> 00:09:14,080 Foster drew inspiration from the science fiction of his youth. 140 00:09:14,080 --> 00:09:17,920 There was a character called Flash Gordon, 141 00:09:17,920 --> 00:09:20,240 and he produced across a black chasm, 142 00:09:20,240 --> 00:09:23,360 by pressing a switch, literally a blade of light, 143 00:09:23,360 --> 00:09:27,280 and they all ran on this blade of light and escaped the villains. 144 00:09:30,960 --> 00:09:34,480 The line between architecture and engineering has often been 145 00:09:34,480 --> 00:09:38,280 blurred by Foster, both visibly in the forms of his structures, 146 00:09:38,280 --> 00:09:43,160 and in the greater role he gave to engineers in the design process. 147 00:09:43,160 --> 00:09:45,600 The Millennium Bridge was a collaboration 148 00:09:45,600 --> 00:09:48,840 with the engineering firm which Foster and his peers 149 00:09:48,840 --> 00:09:51,080 most frequently relied upon - Arup. 150 00:09:52,200 --> 00:09:56,440 In the best collaborations, it's totally seamless, 151 00:09:56,440 --> 00:09:59,360 I mean, everybody is contributing. 152 00:09:59,360 --> 00:10:02,280 There was certainly a tacit agreement with us that we wanted 153 00:10:02,280 --> 00:10:04,920 something really sharp and simple and elegant, 154 00:10:04,920 --> 00:10:08,960 that we wanted to pare it right down to the things which made a bridge. 155 00:10:10,640 --> 00:10:14,160 Foster and Arup came up with an innovative new take 156 00:10:14,160 --> 00:10:16,840 on the suspension bridge. 157 00:10:16,840 --> 00:10:21,280 Instead of hanging cables vertically from tall masts, 158 00:10:21,280 --> 00:10:23,440 here, the cables run horizontally. 159 00:10:25,280 --> 00:10:28,320 Just two sets of concrete arms hold them up, 160 00:10:28,320 --> 00:10:32,600 as they span the 320m between shores. 161 00:10:35,440 --> 00:10:39,640 It's an engineering feat. It stretches the boundaries, 162 00:10:39,640 --> 00:10:42,920 and in so doing, created a momentary, 163 00:10:42,920 --> 00:10:46,360 but very distressing, embarrassment. 164 00:10:55,400 --> 00:10:57,680 On the opening day we saw this behaviour, 165 00:10:57,680 --> 00:10:59,600 this sideways behaviour, the wobble! 166 00:11:02,120 --> 00:11:04,960 We'd carried out dynamic tests on the bridge, 167 00:11:04,960 --> 00:11:09,760 but it was something that we hadn't predicted and I didn't like it. 168 00:11:11,720 --> 00:11:16,240 A structure hyped as an absolute statement of our capabilities 169 00:11:16,240 --> 00:11:18,760 at the beginning of the 21st century, 170 00:11:18,760 --> 00:11:22,360 was closed just days after its grand opening. 171 00:11:22,360 --> 00:11:24,560 Engineers set to work finding out 172 00:11:24,560 --> 00:11:27,360 what had made pedestrians feel so queasy. 173 00:11:27,360 --> 00:11:29,960 There were various theories which were put forward, 174 00:11:29,960 --> 00:11:32,600 there were big flags on the bridge and some people told us 175 00:11:32,600 --> 00:11:35,920 that they thought it was due to the wind. Wasn't due to the wind. 176 00:11:37,680 --> 00:11:42,200 Some suggested the pioneering structure itself was to blame, 177 00:11:42,200 --> 00:11:44,640 but the cause turned out to be something which can affect 178 00:11:44,640 --> 00:11:48,960 much more substantial bridges as well - the wrong type of walking. 179 00:11:48,960 --> 00:11:52,280 Our centre of mass moves very slightly from side to side 180 00:11:52,280 --> 00:11:56,280 as we walk and that means we put in a small force sideways. 181 00:11:57,320 --> 00:11:59,600 During the bridge's opening weekend, 182 00:11:59,600 --> 00:12:02,640 hundreds of people crowding on to it at once 183 00:12:02,640 --> 00:12:06,160 meant those small sideways forces began to be magnified. 184 00:12:06,160 --> 00:12:09,640 What happened then is known as the "feedback effect". 185 00:12:11,680 --> 00:12:14,800 We sense a very slight movement beneath us 186 00:12:14,800 --> 00:12:17,640 and adjust our step to that movement. 187 00:12:17,640 --> 00:12:22,000 As a result, the crowd's footfalls became synchronised. 188 00:12:22,000 --> 00:12:24,520 And the more we walk in time with it, 189 00:12:24,520 --> 00:12:27,160 as we're marching from side to side in step, 190 00:12:27,160 --> 00:12:28,920 the more the bridge wobbles, 191 00:12:28,920 --> 00:12:32,520 as, obviously, has now become the term for it. 192 00:12:32,520 --> 00:12:35,520 The solution was quite straightforward, 193 00:12:35,520 --> 00:12:38,000 a variety of dampers were added. 194 00:12:38,000 --> 00:12:41,160 The bridge finally reopened in 2002. 195 00:12:42,440 --> 00:12:45,320 But whatever they've done to eliminate that sway, 196 00:12:45,320 --> 00:12:48,120 everyone knows that for years to come the Millennium Bridge 197 00:12:48,120 --> 00:12:50,800 will be known to all the people who cross it 198 00:12:50,800 --> 00:12:52,680 simply as the "wobbly bridge". 199 00:12:52,680 --> 00:12:56,400 The cost of fixing it added an extra five million to the bridge's 200 00:12:56,400 --> 00:12:58,800 original £18 million budget. 201 00:13:00,240 --> 00:13:03,280 Of course it's been an embarrassment... 202 00:13:03,280 --> 00:13:06,920 But as you know, it was a new phenomena, 203 00:13:06,920 --> 00:13:11,360 it was something that the codes, the rules had never taken into account. 204 00:13:11,360 --> 00:13:14,840 But you have to remember, it was always safe. 205 00:13:20,800 --> 00:13:22,680 Foster won more immediate acclaim 206 00:13:22,680 --> 00:13:25,480 for some of his other Lottery-funded projects, 207 00:13:25,480 --> 00:13:28,080 such as the new roof for the British Museum. 208 00:13:29,120 --> 00:13:32,760 The great Victorian engineers, such as Paxton and Brunel 209 00:13:32,760 --> 00:13:36,000 remained a visible influence on this generation, 210 00:13:36,000 --> 00:13:40,960 both here and at Foster's National Botanic Garden of Wales. 211 00:13:40,960 --> 00:13:44,000 When it came to giant greenhouses however, 212 00:13:44,000 --> 00:13:47,480 a rival project was to catch the public's imagination, 213 00:13:47,480 --> 00:13:50,880 though it struggled to win Lottery backing. 214 00:13:50,880 --> 00:13:53,400 Eden started with Tim Smit saying, 215 00:13:53,400 --> 00:13:57,880 "I want to build the biggest greenhouse in the world. Full stop." 216 00:13:57,880 --> 00:14:00,960 We met up with him and said, "We'd like to offer you the chance to work 217 00:14:00,960 --> 00:14:05,160 "on the eighth wonder of the world and, by the way, we can't pay you." 218 00:14:05,160 --> 00:14:08,400 I didn't expect to hear back from them at all, 219 00:14:08,400 --> 00:14:10,520 and they called the next day. 220 00:14:24,760 --> 00:14:27,520 Tim Smit's goal was to raise environmental awareness 221 00:14:27,520 --> 00:14:31,080 by recreating the climates and ecosystems of parts of the globe, 222 00:14:31,080 --> 00:14:35,080 very far from the south-west of England. 223 00:14:36,280 --> 00:14:39,080 It almost is a piece of science fiction, isn't it? 224 00:14:39,080 --> 00:14:42,360 Because to create a 4.5 acre rainforest in Cornwall 225 00:14:42,360 --> 00:14:45,360 and to do it entirely under this sort of lightweight dome, 226 00:14:45,360 --> 00:14:48,480 is slightly science fiction. 227 00:14:48,480 --> 00:14:51,600 And I wanted us to create a place that was so startling, 228 00:14:51,600 --> 00:14:54,760 that even if you were the greatest cynic in the world, 229 00:14:54,760 --> 00:14:56,960 for a moment, you would drop your guard. 230 00:14:59,600 --> 00:15:01,640 Several people thought he was a bit crazy, 231 00:15:01,640 --> 00:15:04,680 and a bit overambitious, including the Millennium Commission. 232 00:15:05,600 --> 00:15:07,520 When he really got going, 233 00:15:07,520 --> 00:15:11,400 I don't think anyone could resist him, really. 234 00:15:13,560 --> 00:15:18,280 Eden's eco-architecture began to take shape in 1996, 235 00:15:18,280 --> 00:15:21,440 when architects and client met for dinner. 236 00:15:21,440 --> 00:15:24,800 We had a few glasses of wine, as you do, and discussed the idea, 237 00:15:24,800 --> 00:15:27,320 and, inevitably, the napkins came out, that was all we had. 238 00:15:27,320 --> 00:15:29,560 And these are the sketches, there were a lot of them, 239 00:15:29,560 --> 00:15:31,760 they were feverish, and what you see is the start 240 00:15:31,760 --> 00:15:34,720 of the full-span beams that they were working on. 241 00:15:34,720 --> 00:15:36,840 I'm really glad we've got them because, you know, 242 00:15:36,840 --> 00:15:39,600 when people say, I designed something on the back of a fag packet, 243 00:15:39,600 --> 00:15:42,240 this is the nearest you get to the fag packet. 244 00:15:44,040 --> 00:15:48,240 These first ideas resemble one of Grimshaw's earlier designs, 245 00:15:48,240 --> 00:15:51,080 the Eurostar terminal at Waterloo. 246 00:15:51,080 --> 00:15:54,400 But repeating that mix of metal trusses and glass 247 00:15:54,400 --> 00:15:57,040 was an impossibly expensive prospect, 248 00:15:57,040 --> 00:16:00,440 not least because Eden was going to be built 249 00:16:00,440 --> 00:16:03,080 on exhausted, uneven clay pits. 250 00:16:03,080 --> 00:16:07,840 The idea of fitting something onto an irregular-shaped ground profile, 251 00:16:07,840 --> 00:16:11,400 meant that you had to have something 252 00:16:11,400 --> 00:16:17,280 which could be snipped off at the base to follow the ground. 253 00:16:17,280 --> 00:16:20,240 The guy who cracked it - it was cracked out of desperation - 254 00:16:20,240 --> 00:16:23,000 was David Kirkland, who was the youngest of the architects. 255 00:16:23,000 --> 00:16:26,320 and he and Andrew Whalley were working together, under Nick's direction, 256 00:16:26,320 --> 00:16:29,560 and David was doing the washing-up and he saw the soap bubbles 257 00:16:29,560 --> 00:16:32,600 landing on the side of the draining board and he went, 258 00:16:32,600 --> 00:16:35,520 "A-ha! Bubbles!" Because whatever happens with the ground, 259 00:16:35,520 --> 00:16:37,000 they fit to wherever they are. 260 00:16:43,120 --> 00:16:46,160 There's another figure crucial to the Eden story, 261 00:16:46,160 --> 00:16:49,040 someone who had inspired all of the High-Tech architects 262 00:16:49,040 --> 00:16:52,280 back in the '60s - Buckminster Fuller. 263 00:16:52,280 --> 00:16:55,320 I'm an explorer in structures. 264 00:16:55,320 --> 00:16:59,040 I'm interested in the fundamental principles 265 00:16:59,040 --> 00:17:02,880 by which nature holds her shapes together. 266 00:17:02,880 --> 00:17:05,880 Fuller was the inventor of the geodesic dome, 267 00:17:05,880 --> 00:17:10,040 a curved structure formed from smaller geometric shapes. 268 00:17:10,040 --> 00:17:12,920 Six of them greet the visitor to Eden. 269 00:17:12,920 --> 00:17:16,440 Bucky was terrifically right, philosophically, 270 00:17:16,440 --> 00:17:19,840 about the globe and about sustainability. 271 00:17:19,840 --> 00:17:23,600 What's attractive about geodesic domes was the lightness 272 00:17:23,600 --> 00:17:26,360 and efficiency of use of materials, 273 00:17:26,360 --> 00:17:30,000 those philosophical drivers which were behind Eden, really. 274 00:17:32,520 --> 00:17:36,400 Grimshaw and the team spent two years refining their design, 275 00:17:36,400 --> 00:17:40,080 before the Millennium Commission would agree Eden might work 276 00:17:40,080 --> 00:17:42,400 and construction could begin. 277 00:17:49,320 --> 00:17:53,680 I believe the geodesic dome is the weakest structure known 278 00:17:53,680 --> 00:17:56,600 to humankind until the last bit goes in, 279 00:17:56,600 --> 00:17:58,960 when it becomes the strongest. 280 00:18:04,960 --> 00:18:07,880 So, we ended up with, I think, 240 miles of scaffolding. 281 00:18:07,880 --> 00:18:10,440 Everybody was really excited about it, except anybody 282 00:18:10,440 --> 00:18:13,000 who was trying to build a house elsewhere in Cornwall, 283 00:18:13,000 --> 00:18:14,760 they couldn't get any scaffolding! 284 00:18:14,760 --> 00:18:17,760 It became the biggest freestanding scaffolding in the world 285 00:18:17,760 --> 00:18:19,680 and is in the Guinness Book Of Records. 286 00:18:24,080 --> 00:18:29,040 Unlike the great greenhouses of the past, this one doesn't use glass. 287 00:18:29,040 --> 00:18:32,360 To help the structure be as eco-friendly as its contents, 288 00:18:32,360 --> 00:18:35,240 it relies on a fluoropolymer. 289 00:18:35,240 --> 00:18:38,160 No-one had ever built using ETFE, 290 00:18:38,160 --> 00:18:41,960 ethyl tetrafluoroethylene foil, before to this scale. 291 00:18:43,840 --> 00:18:46,880 The great thing about the ETFE foil is it uses 1% of the volume 292 00:18:46,880 --> 00:18:49,840 of material that a glass structure would have used. 293 00:18:49,840 --> 00:18:53,120 So, in other words, it's environmentally much more efficient. 294 00:18:53,120 --> 00:18:56,520 Literally, one person could carry it up, put it in place, 295 00:18:56,520 --> 00:18:59,760 and then it, basically, just clamps around the edge, 296 00:18:59,760 --> 00:19:02,320 and then you fill it with air and it inflates. 297 00:19:15,240 --> 00:19:18,360 For all the technology required to create Eden, 298 00:19:18,360 --> 00:19:20,560 what's most striking about the end result 299 00:19:20,560 --> 00:19:25,160 is that it feels somehow organic, a perfect match of form with function. 300 00:19:29,240 --> 00:19:31,600 In just the first three months of opening, 301 00:19:31,600 --> 00:19:34,440 more than a million people came to see it. 302 00:19:34,440 --> 00:19:37,000 It was the reaction from people who were stood there 303 00:19:37,000 --> 00:19:39,880 and were emotionally moved, which I found, you know, 304 00:19:39,880 --> 00:19:43,280 for a piece of architecture to do that was, personally, very exciting. 305 00:19:45,440 --> 00:19:47,120 By the turn of the millennium, 306 00:19:47,120 --> 00:19:50,920 architecture that would once have seemed far out, 307 00:19:50,920 --> 00:19:52,880 had become a nice day out. 308 00:19:52,880 --> 00:19:55,840 Grimshaw and his peers had been fired up by technology 309 00:19:55,840 --> 00:19:59,760 since the '60s, but some of us only really came to terms with it 310 00:19:59,760 --> 00:20:03,120 in the era of the mobile phone and internet. 311 00:20:03,120 --> 00:20:06,560 By the end of the '90s, almost every man, every woman, 312 00:20:06,560 --> 00:20:10,560 is becoming part of a truly new world in some ways. 313 00:20:10,560 --> 00:20:13,400 There's a leap in technology at the time 314 00:20:13,400 --> 00:20:15,400 and that leap in technology 315 00:20:15,400 --> 00:20:18,240 was something that would sit much more happily 316 00:20:18,240 --> 00:20:20,400 with an advanced progressive architecture. 317 00:20:20,400 --> 00:20:22,440 People being teched up! 318 00:20:26,920 --> 00:20:28,400 Perhaps the ultimate proof 319 00:20:28,400 --> 00:20:30,600 of Britain's new-found ease with modernity 320 00:20:30,600 --> 00:20:33,520 was the appointment of Hopkins Architects 321 00:20:33,520 --> 00:20:36,040 to build a new office block for MPs, 322 00:20:36,040 --> 00:20:39,120 in one of the nation's most historic locations. 323 00:20:55,000 --> 00:20:57,120 Back in the '70s, the goal of High-Tech 324 00:20:57,120 --> 00:21:00,360 was to create lightweight and flexible buildings, 325 00:21:00,360 --> 00:21:03,240 but Hopkins now faced a very different brief. 326 00:21:04,280 --> 00:21:06,320 One thing they did specify, I think, 327 00:21:06,320 --> 00:21:09,680 was that it had to have a 150-year life. 328 00:21:12,000 --> 00:21:14,080 It's a World Heritage Site, 329 00:21:14,080 --> 00:21:16,320 you weren't going to put up a standard office block. 330 00:21:19,800 --> 00:21:23,160 Being next to this icon that is the Palace of Westminster, 331 00:21:23,160 --> 00:21:26,200 it would have been stupid to have built it in brick perhaps, 332 00:21:26,200 --> 00:21:29,600 or, you know, rendered concrete or whatever. 333 00:21:29,600 --> 00:21:32,880 I think we had to use decent materials 334 00:21:38,160 --> 00:21:40,080 They wanted a feeling of permanence 335 00:21:40,080 --> 00:21:43,600 and the idea was that a good stone would do that. 336 00:21:43,600 --> 00:21:46,640 We had to find the find right kind of stone, which wasn't easy, 337 00:21:46,640 --> 00:21:49,040 I mean, we got geological specialists involved. 338 00:21:54,560 --> 00:21:56,920 Every stone that they cut out is numbered, 339 00:21:56,920 --> 00:22:00,120 where it came out of the quarry, and at the top of the building 340 00:22:00,120 --> 00:22:04,840 you put the stones that you've cut from the top of the quarry. 341 00:22:04,840 --> 00:22:07,160 At the bottom of the building, you put the stones 342 00:22:07,160 --> 00:22:09,840 that you've taken out of the bottom of the quarry, 343 00:22:09,840 --> 00:22:13,880 so that the stones at the bottom are stronger than the stones at the top. 344 00:22:16,840 --> 00:22:20,000 Though they'd chosen an ancient building material, 345 00:22:20,000 --> 00:22:23,240 Hopkins brought a modern approach to using it. 346 00:22:23,240 --> 00:22:26,800 Off-site prefabrication, the process this generation had always favoured, 347 00:22:26,800 --> 00:22:30,360 was applied here to stone as well as concrete. 348 00:22:32,200 --> 00:22:35,760 Their belief in honest, efficient structures, meanwhile, 349 00:22:35,760 --> 00:22:37,800 led to piers which aren't straight. 350 00:22:39,480 --> 00:22:40,800 They taper as they go up 351 00:22:40,800 --> 00:22:44,480 because there's less load at the top than there is at the bottom, 352 00:22:44,480 --> 00:22:47,400 and we get an architectural expression coming out. 353 00:22:47,400 --> 00:22:49,000 A sort of structural truth. 354 00:22:56,640 --> 00:22:59,320 What made Hopkins the go-to modern architects 355 00:22:59,320 --> 00:23:03,560 for traditional institutions was their ability to mix functionalism 356 00:23:03,560 --> 00:23:06,320 with the sensitivity to historical context. 357 00:23:07,680 --> 00:23:11,000 You've got the Palace of Westminster, which is quite roofy, 358 00:23:11,000 --> 00:23:14,280 quite spiky, and if you look to the right, 359 00:23:14,280 --> 00:23:18,200 you see Norman Shaw's Scotland Yard building, 360 00:23:18,200 --> 00:23:21,480 which also has a sort of strong roofline 361 00:23:21,480 --> 00:23:24,920 and it seemed to me, it was incumbent on us 362 00:23:24,920 --> 00:23:28,120 to make the same general roof level. 363 00:23:29,160 --> 00:23:31,120 They did this by making a feature 364 00:23:31,120 --> 00:23:35,040 of the building's ultra-low energy environmental engineering. 365 00:23:36,120 --> 00:23:38,880 They're not chimneys, they're heat exchangers, 366 00:23:38,880 --> 00:23:43,760 which extract from the exhaust air 367 00:23:43,760 --> 00:23:46,760 any useful heat or coolth. 368 00:23:48,880 --> 00:23:54,240 We make architectural compositions out of these functional elements. 369 00:23:55,560 --> 00:23:59,200 Like Rogers and Foster, Hopkins discovered there was a downside 370 00:23:59,200 --> 00:24:01,840 to winning the most prestigious jobs. 371 00:24:01,840 --> 00:24:04,920 Portcullis House got a lot of bad press, 372 00:24:04,920 --> 00:24:07,680 mostly due to its cost - £235 million. 373 00:24:10,000 --> 00:24:12,440 One of the reasons it was so expensive was because 374 00:24:12,440 --> 00:24:15,600 it was built in the largest hole in Europe - at that time anyway! 375 00:24:15,600 --> 00:24:19,320 Caused by, of course, the extension of the Jubilee Line. 376 00:24:19,320 --> 00:24:22,800 There had once been a surface-level station at Westminster. 377 00:24:22,800 --> 00:24:26,120 The old lines were lowered to make room for Portcullis House 378 00:24:26,120 --> 00:24:29,080 when the Jubilee Line tunnels were dug underneath. 379 00:24:32,480 --> 00:24:36,520 Hopkins designed what was underground as well as what was overground. 380 00:24:45,080 --> 00:24:47,600 But you just dig a bloody great hole in the ground 381 00:24:47,600 --> 00:24:52,480 and prop the sides apart from each other and put escalators into it. 382 00:24:57,160 --> 00:25:00,880 You leave the sides raw, just crudest engineering, 383 00:25:00,880 --> 00:25:04,320 you don't put finishes where you don't need finishes. 384 00:25:11,480 --> 00:25:14,360 And you enjoy the experience, it's just like going caving, 385 00:25:14,360 --> 00:25:18,360 there's a sort of hi tech thing running through the middle of it. 386 00:25:20,920 --> 00:25:24,520 Though the materials look different, below, as above ground, 387 00:25:24,520 --> 00:25:27,960 this is architecture which shows you exactly how it's done. 388 00:25:32,320 --> 00:25:36,560 A six-storey hole is no-one's idea of a firm foundation, 389 00:25:36,560 --> 00:25:40,560 yet it was on this void that the MPs' new offices had to sit. 390 00:25:41,960 --> 00:25:46,240 These great piers that you see coming down in the middle of it 391 00:25:46,240 --> 00:25:48,440 are actually the piers that run up 392 00:25:48,440 --> 00:25:54,040 and support the interior part of the structure of the building above. 393 00:26:01,800 --> 00:26:03,640 In the central courtyard above, 394 00:26:03,640 --> 00:26:07,400 you can see exactly how the building's load is spread, 395 00:26:07,400 --> 00:26:10,960 by these muscular concrete arches and steel ties. 396 00:26:27,320 --> 00:26:29,800 The atrium, I think, has become the focal centre 397 00:26:29,800 --> 00:26:33,280 for Members of Parliament, to a very great extent. 398 00:26:33,280 --> 00:26:38,680 There's no equivalent room that size in the rest of the Palace. 399 00:26:41,520 --> 00:26:43,960 It's this area of the architects' design 400 00:26:43,960 --> 00:26:46,960 which has kept Portcullis House in the headlines. 401 00:26:48,960 --> 00:26:52,760 They have a well-being function, but their technical function 402 00:26:52,760 --> 00:26:54,720 is to reduce the amount of light 403 00:26:54,720 --> 00:26:57,480 that's coming through the glass roof above you. 404 00:27:00,560 --> 00:27:03,520 But I think anything to do with Parliament 405 00:27:03,520 --> 00:27:07,560 has got plenty of people waiting to lob brickbats. 406 00:27:10,760 --> 00:27:14,000 At the same time as Hopkins was working on a prestigious 407 00:27:14,000 --> 00:27:17,240 parliamentary building, so were Rogers and Foster. 408 00:27:18,400 --> 00:27:22,040 As young men, they'd felt excluded from the establishment. 409 00:27:22,040 --> 00:27:25,000 Now, they were attempting to rebuild it from within. 410 00:27:26,800 --> 00:27:28,880 When Germany reunified, 411 00:27:28,880 --> 00:27:33,000 Norman Foster won the job of remodelling its Reichstag. 412 00:27:33,000 --> 00:27:36,160 He applied the same principles of openness and equality 413 00:27:36,160 --> 00:27:40,200 which he'd previously brought to offices and airports. 414 00:27:40,200 --> 00:27:44,000 I think the Reichstag was a complete reinterpretation 415 00:27:44,000 --> 00:27:47,640 of the relationship between the body politic and the public. 416 00:27:47,640 --> 00:27:51,000 The public are symbolically above the Assembly, 417 00:27:51,000 --> 00:27:54,920 they look down on the politicians, who are answerable to them 418 00:27:54,920 --> 00:27:59,280 and that roof, transparent, is also a public space. 419 00:28:01,400 --> 00:28:04,320 It's an attempt to remove the pomp from power, 420 00:28:04,320 --> 00:28:07,440 to create a national symbol which isn't a monument. 421 00:28:09,720 --> 00:28:13,200 The relationship between people and politicians is also 422 00:28:13,200 --> 00:28:16,800 redefined by the Senedd, the home for the Welsh Assembly. 423 00:28:18,240 --> 00:28:19,560 What they wanted 424 00:28:19,560 --> 00:28:22,200 was a place where they could have their political discussions 425 00:28:22,200 --> 00:28:24,880 and what we brought to it was the public domain. 426 00:28:27,600 --> 00:28:30,160 We'll have a piazza that starts at Cardiff Bay 427 00:28:30,160 --> 00:28:32,720 and goes all the way through the building, right through it, 428 00:28:32,720 --> 00:28:35,480 underneath what we have called the "democratic roof". 429 00:28:43,080 --> 00:28:47,640 And we put the people of Wales above and the Assembly below. 430 00:28:49,920 --> 00:28:52,800 And it was part of accentuating this idea 431 00:28:52,800 --> 00:28:56,680 that you need to engage with the people. 432 00:29:02,120 --> 00:29:03,640 Back in the '60s, 433 00:29:03,640 --> 00:29:07,800 Buckminster Fuller had taught these architects to think about ecology. 434 00:29:07,800 --> 00:29:10,880 In the 21st century, their buildings have increasingly been shaped 435 00:29:10,880 --> 00:29:13,280 by the need for sustainability. 436 00:29:19,440 --> 00:29:24,280 This is a zero-carbon, zero-waste building, it's totally renewable. 437 00:29:24,280 --> 00:29:27,800 So, in that sense, it's a mini manifesto 438 00:29:27,800 --> 00:29:31,960 and it practises what the politicians preach. 439 00:29:38,120 --> 00:29:41,440 The Welsh Assembly had it written into their constitution 440 00:29:41,440 --> 00:29:43,320 an obligation to be sustainable. 441 00:29:43,320 --> 00:29:46,600 It is the lowest energy-consuming building we've built, 442 00:29:46,600 --> 00:29:49,680 from where the materials come from 443 00:29:49,680 --> 00:29:53,480 to the source of energy used to heat the building. 444 00:29:53,480 --> 00:29:55,720 And, you know, we're using that, again, 445 00:29:55,720 --> 00:29:58,520 as a constraint to help define the architecture. 446 00:30:02,600 --> 00:30:06,040 The obvious form is the form of the debating chamber. 447 00:30:06,040 --> 00:30:08,480 It's about light, and also about air. 448 00:30:14,200 --> 00:30:18,200 It is truly a space that is driven by natural ventilation 449 00:30:18,200 --> 00:30:22,400 and, of course, the joke is it's the hot air of the debating chamber. 450 00:30:22,400 --> 00:30:25,320 We could have seen that one coming, I guess! 451 00:30:29,880 --> 00:30:34,360 Back in Westminster, even the home of police and prisons got a more human face, 452 00:30:34,360 --> 00:30:38,360 from the other star name of this generation - Terry Farrell. 453 00:30:48,520 --> 00:30:53,840 Terry Farrell collaborated with Turner Prize winner Liam Gillick on this project. 454 00:30:53,840 --> 00:30:57,720 Functional features such as screens to prevent heat gain 455 00:30:57,720 --> 00:30:59,520 have been turned into art. 456 00:30:59,520 --> 00:31:01,640 The letters glimpsed on many windows 457 00:31:01,640 --> 00:31:04,960 were originally intended to spell out a slogan 458 00:31:04,960 --> 00:31:07,720 which would appeal to any old radical. 459 00:31:07,720 --> 00:31:11,480 You couldn't read it cos all you saw was bits of letters 460 00:31:11,480 --> 00:31:14,320 and then it went round the corner and round the corner, 461 00:31:14,320 --> 00:31:19,120 and he chose, "If all the world lived in harmony, there would be no need for this building." 462 00:31:19,120 --> 00:31:23,480 In other words, there would be no need for a police force or prisons. 463 00:31:23,480 --> 00:31:25,920 At that point, that became the centre of focus, 464 00:31:25,920 --> 00:31:28,160 "Oh, you can't say that, you can't say that." 465 00:31:29,200 --> 00:31:31,200 To appreciate the positive impact 466 00:31:31,200 --> 00:31:34,440 this generation had on modern architecture in Britain, 467 00:31:34,440 --> 00:31:38,400 look no further than what stood on exactly the same site before - 468 00:31:38,400 --> 00:31:41,400 government offices built at the start of the '70s. 469 00:31:42,440 --> 00:31:45,760 These tall buildings were totally inappropriate. 470 00:31:45,760 --> 00:31:49,920 They intruded into the skyline behind the Houses of Parliament. 471 00:31:49,920 --> 00:31:54,440 They were hugely inefficient and what's more, it was falling to bits! 472 00:31:54,440 --> 00:32:00,040 And, so, I argued it is possible to get the same accommodation in, 473 00:32:00,040 --> 00:32:02,280 in a building that's more horizontal, 474 00:32:02,280 --> 00:32:05,080 a groundscraper rather than the skyscrapers. 475 00:32:07,560 --> 00:32:11,840 Farrell's replacement is undoubtedly less oppressive. 476 00:32:11,840 --> 00:32:15,280 It's three buildings all linked with cross-bridges, 477 00:32:15,280 --> 00:32:19,120 and each of the three buildings is round a large atrium, 478 00:32:19,120 --> 00:32:21,240 and the base of each atrium, 479 00:32:21,240 --> 00:32:24,640 I said, was public realm, it was like a square. 480 00:32:24,640 --> 00:32:28,440 It was a place where, in fact, all the staff gather and so on. 481 00:32:29,880 --> 00:32:33,280 The Home Office is on the same scale as some of Farrell's work 482 00:32:33,280 --> 00:32:37,600 from the '80s and '90s, but draws a lot less attention to itself. 483 00:32:37,600 --> 00:32:40,200 Style became quite an issue for me. 484 00:32:41,280 --> 00:32:44,600 After MI6 and TV-am and Embankment Place, 485 00:32:44,600 --> 00:32:48,480 I didn't get any work in London for ten years, 486 00:32:48,480 --> 00:32:52,280 and I knew it was because I was typecast. 487 00:32:52,280 --> 00:32:55,760 And so I took on the Home Office and played a different game. 488 00:32:55,760 --> 00:32:58,280 I said, "It's a background building." 489 00:33:00,080 --> 00:33:02,360 Not all of Terry's buildings from this era 490 00:33:02,360 --> 00:33:04,120 could be called "background". 491 00:33:04,120 --> 00:33:07,320 There's no missing his millennial project in Hull, The Deep. 492 00:33:07,320 --> 00:33:12,200 But having abandoned High-Tech's aversion to decoration, 493 00:33:12,200 --> 00:33:16,760 Farrell's happier than his peers to vary style according to project. 494 00:33:16,760 --> 00:33:19,600 There are some architects you know what you're going to get 495 00:33:19,600 --> 00:33:24,480 in advance and they have a clientele, 496 00:33:24,480 --> 00:33:27,880 a market, that goes to them because they want that thing. 497 00:33:27,880 --> 00:33:30,040 There are other architects 498 00:33:30,040 --> 00:33:33,160 that are about an approach, an attitude, 499 00:33:33,160 --> 00:33:35,160 and I'm more of that kind. 500 00:33:39,080 --> 00:33:42,200 What stays constant in Farrell's work is a concern 501 00:33:42,200 --> 00:33:44,640 not just with the individual building, 502 00:33:44,640 --> 00:33:46,760 but the bigger picture around it. 503 00:33:46,760 --> 00:33:50,000 In the last decade, he's been commissioned to produce a series 504 00:33:50,000 --> 00:33:53,040 of influential master plans for towns and cities 505 00:33:53,040 --> 00:33:54,960 across Britain and the world. 506 00:33:56,440 --> 00:34:00,240 The urban scene in the public realm is, in many ways, 507 00:34:00,240 --> 00:34:04,400 as important as the building and there's a lot of it. 508 00:34:04,400 --> 00:34:07,480 You can get a fine building on a lousy street 509 00:34:07,480 --> 00:34:10,600 and that really pains me and upsets me. I'd rather the street was right 510 00:34:10,600 --> 00:34:13,520 because more people would get pleasure from it. 511 00:34:13,520 --> 00:34:16,640 It'd be great if it was both that were right. 512 00:34:21,560 --> 00:34:24,080 He's moved on to be very, very respected 513 00:34:24,080 --> 00:34:25,960 for his kind of visionary approach 514 00:34:25,960 --> 00:34:28,920 to how you can knit lots of ideas about a city together, 515 00:34:28,920 --> 00:34:31,360 and he has the ability to present these ideas 516 00:34:31,360 --> 00:34:34,160 in a way that everybody gets and wants to be part of. 517 00:34:35,160 --> 00:34:38,040 By the 21st century, all of these architects 518 00:34:38,040 --> 00:34:41,240 were working on a much broader canvas than before. 519 00:34:41,240 --> 00:34:43,960 This was a generation which had always believed 520 00:34:43,960 --> 00:34:45,480 it could change the world. 521 00:34:45,480 --> 00:34:50,840 Now, it was doing so through advocacy and shaping public policy. 522 00:34:50,840 --> 00:34:52,200 I really believe in cities, 523 00:34:52,200 --> 00:34:55,480 and that's really the critical thing I've been talking about. 524 00:34:55,480 --> 00:34:58,560 A compact city where you live, you work, play, 525 00:34:58,560 --> 00:35:03,000 and, of course, a city that is well designed with a good public domain. 526 00:35:03,000 --> 00:35:07,160 To spread this gospel, a man who'd marched against the government 527 00:35:07,160 --> 00:35:11,200 in the '60s, joined it in the late '90s, 528 00:35:11,200 --> 00:35:14,360 as advisor to the Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, 529 00:35:14,360 --> 00:35:18,240 and Chair of the National Urban Taskforce. 530 00:35:18,240 --> 00:35:21,240 Rogers affected the whole look of British cities 531 00:35:21,240 --> 00:35:23,320 around about the time of the millennium. 532 00:35:23,320 --> 00:35:26,400 He was a seriously important guy in the government. 533 00:35:26,400 --> 00:35:29,720 Architecture is political, if you don't work with the politicians 534 00:35:29,720 --> 00:35:31,640 then you can't be an architect. 535 00:35:31,640 --> 00:35:34,720 If you have any vision, you have to get it across. 536 00:35:35,760 --> 00:35:39,400 It's partly because of Rogers' campaigns for denser use of land 537 00:35:39,400 --> 00:35:41,600 that the skylines of British cities 538 00:35:41,600 --> 00:35:43,960 have soared upwards in the last few years. 539 00:35:43,960 --> 00:35:46,560 His old friend Foster played a part in that too, 540 00:35:46,560 --> 00:35:49,880 though not through political campaigning. 541 00:35:49,880 --> 00:35:52,520 Even at the start of the 21st century, 542 00:35:52,520 --> 00:35:55,080 the City of London was largely low-rise, 543 00:35:55,080 --> 00:35:58,720 still suspicious of towers after the mistakes of the '60s. 544 00:36:06,760 --> 00:36:11,760 What finally taught Britain to love the skyscraper was a gherkin. 545 00:36:11,760 --> 00:36:15,240 Its popularity paved the way for many others to follow in its wake. 546 00:36:15,240 --> 00:36:20,360 Yet, in 1997, when Foster first unveiled plans for this site, 547 00:36:20,360 --> 00:36:23,960 no tower seemed likely to get planning permission. 548 00:36:23,960 --> 00:36:27,160 Plans for the tallest building in Europe were put on show today. 549 00:36:27,160 --> 00:36:33,880 The Millennium Tower, with 84 storeys, would reach 1,265 feet. 550 00:36:33,880 --> 00:36:37,320 But, this being Britain, it's inevitably controversial. 551 00:36:39,960 --> 00:36:44,440 The super-high tower becomes you know, the symbol of the future, 552 00:36:44,440 --> 00:36:48,160 and, inevitably, it pushes the boundaries, stretch the limits. 553 00:36:48,160 --> 00:36:50,680 I mean, how could any architect resist that? 554 00:36:50,680 --> 00:36:52,920 I mean, it's a dream. 555 00:36:56,800 --> 00:37:00,080 The property developers Trafalgar House looked forward 556 00:37:00,080 --> 00:37:04,320 to over 80 floors of rental revenue, all from one small plot of land. 557 00:37:05,360 --> 00:37:08,040 But not everyone bought into the dream. 558 00:37:08,040 --> 00:37:11,080 I don't think it was a particularly good piece of architecture 559 00:37:11,080 --> 00:37:12,920 and I thought that the building looked 560 00:37:12,920 --> 00:37:15,200 like a frightened rabbit from Watership Down, 561 00:37:15,200 --> 00:37:16,760 it had these two ears on the top. 562 00:37:16,760 --> 00:37:21,960 The main thing was it was very, very tall and it shocked London. 563 00:37:23,480 --> 00:37:26,040 Foster's team went back to the drawing board, 564 00:37:26,040 --> 00:37:28,400 to try to come up with something which would overcome 565 00:37:28,400 --> 00:37:31,080 the widespread resistance to tall towers. 566 00:37:32,160 --> 00:37:34,720 While they did so, the site changed hands, 567 00:37:34,720 --> 00:37:38,760 from a speculative developer to insurance firm, Swiss Re, 568 00:37:38,760 --> 00:37:40,320 who needed a new home. 569 00:37:41,440 --> 00:37:46,320 There are clients who can spark a creative initiative 570 00:37:46,320 --> 00:37:49,560 and make a major contribution to a design. 571 00:37:49,560 --> 00:37:51,120 Someone said the other day, 572 00:37:51,120 --> 00:37:54,360 "Oh, yes, well, Swiss Re was out for an iconic building," 573 00:37:54,360 --> 00:37:56,240 and I looked at them, I said, 574 00:37:56,240 --> 00:37:59,720 "On the contrary. Nobody even thought like that." 575 00:38:00,720 --> 00:38:02,960 A really important objective 576 00:38:02,960 --> 00:38:06,960 was creating a beautiful space for people to work in. Yes. 577 00:38:06,960 --> 00:38:09,440 So, access to daylight, 578 00:38:09,440 --> 00:38:14,160 access to amenities and good working conditions. 579 00:38:18,160 --> 00:38:20,680 A circular floor plan meant all the employees 580 00:38:20,680 --> 00:38:22,440 would be nearer the window, 581 00:38:22,440 --> 00:38:25,640 giving them more natural light and better views. 582 00:38:27,640 --> 00:38:30,720 The reason this tower's not simply a cylinder, 583 00:38:30,720 --> 00:38:35,480 are less to do with its inhabitants and more to do with the public. 584 00:38:35,480 --> 00:38:39,800 Less building at the bottom created a new plaza 585 00:38:39,800 --> 00:38:44,400 and less tower at the tip made it less intrusive on the skyline. 586 00:38:44,400 --> 00:38:47,840 Working out exactly what happened in the middle meanwhile, 587 00:38:47,840 --> 00:38:50,760 took many months, and models. 588 00:38:50,760 --> 00:38:52,960 What we were trying to do is understand 589 00:38:52,960 --> 00:38:54,520 what made a shape elegant. 590 00:38:54,520 --> 00:38:56,960 What were the properties of a complex form 591 00:38:56,960 --> 00:39:00,040 that made that shape elegant? And there's no magical formula. 592 00:39:00,040 --> 00:39:02,120 You can't say, "Oh, it's twice the radius," 593 00:39:02,120 --> 00:39:03,560 or "It's three times the height," 594 00:39:03,560 --> 00:39:05,400 or something like that. It doesn't work. 595 00:39:05,400 --> 00:39:07,920 So, what we did is literally like a beauty parade. 596 00:39:07,920 --> 00:39:11,440 Things like, for example, where the maximum width occurs - 597 00:39:11,440 --> 00:39:13,840 where is the waistline on the building? 598 00:39:13,840 --> 00:39:15,200 Is it high or is it low? 599 00:39:15,200 --> 00:39:17,400 If it's too low the building looks squat and dumpy, 600 00:39:17,400 --> 00:39:21,800 if it's too high the proportions are wrong, it looks top heavy. 601 00:39:21,800 --> 00:39:26,280 So, you can see models like this one where the centre of gravity 602 00:39:26,280 --> 00:39:29,000 is far too low in proportion to the top. 603 00:39:30,440 --> 00:39:33,920 The hope was that all this form-finding would overcome 604 00:39:33,920 --> 00:39:37,840 the opposition which had killed off the Millennium Tower. 605 00:39:37,840 --> 00:39:41,240 I remember the architects arriving in my office 606 00:39:41,240 --> 00:39:44,480 with a model of circular building of a rather dumpy form 607 00:39:44,480 --> 00:39:47,120 and, to their great surprise, I said to them, 608 00:39:47,120 --> 00:39:49,720 "Well, don't you think it could be taller?" 609 00:39:49,720 --> 00:39:51,120 It was a pretty rare moment, 610 00:39:51,120 --> 00:39:54,320 and we tried not to all look at each other like, 611 00:39:54,320 --> 00:39:56,080 "Did he just say that?" 612 00:39:56,080 --> 00:39:58,000 They said, "Well, what do you mean?" 613 00:39:58,000 --> 00:40:01,200 I said "Well, it looks rather fatter than is comfortable 614 00:40:01,200 --> 00:40:04,400 "and rather shorter than is comfortable. What if we squeezed it?" 615 00:40:05,720 --> 00:40:08,560 Though the City of London was now won over, 616 00:40:08,560 --> 00:40:13,080 the tower still faced legal challenges from conservation groups. 617 00:40:13,080 --> 00:40:15,920 But then in 20 years, English Heritage will list it. 618 00:40:15,920 --> 00:40:17,600 I mean, English Heritage broadly. 619 00:40:17,600 --> 00:40:20,560 If you create an organisation that is just there to preserve 620 00:40:20,560 --> 00:40:24,240 things as they are, they are going to be a bit of a pain. 621 00:40:24,240 --> 00:40:27,160 One of the powers of the newly created London Mayor 622 00:40:27,160 --> 00:40:29,800 was to push through planning permission. 623 00:40:29,800 --> 00:40:33,560 The City Corporation wanted me to back it, which I did. 624 00:40:33,560 --> 00:40:35,000 When I ran for office I said, 625 00:40:35,000 --> 00:40:38,600 "I'm going to abolish all these silly rules about height or density. 626 00:40:38,600 --> 00:40:41,440 "Each scheme's got to be judged on its merits." 627 00:40:45,560 --> 00:40:50,120 The tower finally won planning approval in August 2000. 628 00:40:50,120 --> 00:40:54,040 As the Swiss Re Building began to rise on the skyline, 629 00:40:54,040 --> 00:40:56,440 the elegance of the engineering was revealed. 630 00:40:59,840 --> 00:41:01,800 In most skyscrapers, the very top 631 00:41:01,800 --> 00:41:05,080 is reserved for lift machinery and building services. 632 00:41:07,120 --> 00:41:10,760 Foster's team instead topped off their design with a unique space, 633 00:41:10,760 --> 00:41:14,480 which gives 360-degree views of the city. 634 00:41:23,640 --> 00:41:24,960 It was more costly. 635 00:41:24,960 --> 00:41:28,280 Half of my colleagues were saying "This is crazy! 636 00:41:28,280 --> 00:41:30,480 "We can't have this kind of space." 637 00:41:30,480 --> 00:41:33,120 In this particular case, it would have been a travesty 638 00:41:33,120 --> 00:41:35,320 to put that at the top of the building. 639 00:41:39,760 --> 00:41:43,080 The future occupants of the tower clearly loved it, 640 00:41:43,080 --> 00:41:46,040 but the final verdict would be delivered by the public. 641 00:41:46,040 --> 00:41:47,880 I don't think a lot of people were convinced 642 00:41:47,880 --> 00:41:50,600 until they saw the building taking shape. 643 00:41:50,600 --> 00:41:53,960 We have to remember a backdrop to all of this was a press 644 00:41:53,960 --> 00:41:57,680 who were being very negative, attaching a nickname to it, 645 00:41:57,680 --> 00:42:01,840 which I think was meant to be rude, by calling it the Erotic Gherkin. 646 00:42:01,840 --> 00:42:05,400 Well, a number of people did ask where the batteries went. 647 00:42:05,400 --> 00:42:08,920 I felt it was dumb-down name and so we really worked against 648 00:42:08,920 --> 00:42:11,680 allowing people to call it the Gherkin. 649 00:42:11,680 --> 00:42:13,600 And failed. And failed. 650 00:42:13,600 --> 00:42:17,200 That which started as a term of abuse 651 00:42:17,200 --> 00:42:21,880 has ended up being a term of endearment, of affection. 652 00:42:21,880 --> 00:42:25,520 So, I think that's a very nice kind of evolution 653 00:42:25,520 --> 00:42:27,720 over the history of the project. 654 00:42:27,720 --> 00:42:31,080 Very quickly it started to feature in advertisements for London, 655 00:42:31,080 --> 00:42:33,480 it started to take on an iconic status. 656 00:42:33,480 --> 00:42:35,080 You can't design an icon, 657 00:42:35,080 --> 00:42:38,760 it's the public that create an icon after it's been designed. 658 00:42:47,600 --> 00:42:49,720 Many people, including the public, 659 00:42:49,720 --> 00:42:53,080 were responsible for the success of the Gherkin, 660 00:42:53,080 --> 00:42:56,640 yet one name in particular is often given the credit - 661 00:42:56,640 --> 00:42:58,160 and it's not Norman. 662 00:42:58,160 --> 00:43:01,960 Ken Shuttleworth was the Senior Partner at Fosters in charge of the project, 663 00:43:01,960 --> 00:43:06,320 but left, soon after its completion, to set up a firm of his own. 664 00:43:07,600 --> 00:43:10,680 So, is the Gherkin really a Foster building at all? 665 00:43:11,760 --> 00:43:14,120 It would be very unlikely in a large practice 666 00:43:14,120 --> 00:43:18,240 that an architect like Norman Foster would design all the buildings himself. 667 00:43:18,240 --> 00:43:21,280 He had a whole range of brilliant architects 668 00:43:21,280 --> 00:43:25,080 working with and for him, and various of his partners 669 00:43:25,080 --> 00:43:28,440 appeared at different stages of the project. 670 00:43:28,440 --> 00:43:31,960 There is no one person, architect, 671 00:43:31,960 --> 00:43:35,280 engineer, client, consultant, 672 00:43:35,280 --> 00:43:38,200 who can take responsibility. 673 00:43:38,200 --> 00:43:40,640 Only the team can take responsibility. 674 00:43:40,640 --> 00:43:44,160 It's so clearly a culmination of the work 675 00:43:44,160 --> 00:43:47,160 and the agenda and the decades of experience, 676 00:43:47,160 --> 00:43:49,520 it's so CLEARLY a Foster building. 677 00:43:49,520 --> 00:43:53,320 Splitting hairs over who signed off most of the drawings 678 00:43:53,320 --> 00:43:55,480 is just neither here nor there. 679 00:43:55,480 --> 00:43:57,920 Architecture is a team activity, 680 00:43:57,920 --> 00:43:59,600 it takes a lot of people 681 00:43:59,600 --> 00:44:01,960 and this is an extraordinary team. 682 00:44:01,960 --> 00:44:06,200 In the end, the best designs you're really, afterwards, 683 00:44:06,200 --> 00:44:10,800 almost nonplussed about who came up with that idea, this idea. 684 00:44:13,960 --> 00:44:16,000 Speculation about who does what 685 00:44:16,000 --> 00:44:19,320 is inevitable when a firm grows as large as Foster's, 686 00:44:19,320 --> 00:44:23,200 which employs up to 1,500 people. 687 00:44:23,200 --> 00:44:27,200 All five of these architects founded highly successful businesses, 688 00:44:27,200 --> 00:44:31,720 which inevitably took some of their time away from designing. 689 00:44:31,720 --> 00:44:34,600 I still meet clients. 690 00:44:34,600 --> 00:44:37,000 I can't do it on every project, that would be impossible 691 00:44:37,000 --> 00:44:39,000 and I don't pretend to. 692 00:44:39,000 --> 00:44:42,840 I can't pretend that I know every detail of every building, in no way. 693 00:44:45,440 --> 00:44:47,920 London's Cheesegrater, for example, 694 00:44:47,920 --> 00:44:50,840 is often referred to as a Richard Rogers building, 695 00:44:50,840 --> 00:44:55,000 yet it's largely the design of his partner, Graham Stirk. 696 00:44:55,000 --> 00:44:58,640 Their firm has tried to signal the importance of the wider team 697 00:44:58,640 --> 00:45:01,520 by changing its name to Rogers, Stirk + Harbour. 698 00:45:03,800 --> 00:45:05,680 But when it comes to winning work, 699 00:45:05,680 --> 00:45:08,840 the founders are still their most valuable assets. 700 00:45:10,760 --> 00:45:13,840 By the 1990s, Foster had become a kind of brand, 701 00:45:13,840 --> 00:45:17,640 people went to get a Foster building, no question. 702 00:45:17,640 --> 00:45:21,080 The Big Five are "starchitects". 703 00:45:21,080 --> 00:45:25,280 It is a true description of the architects around the world 704 00:45:25,280 --> 00:45:28,800 who are competing for being on this list 705 00:45:28,800 --> 00:45:32,480 of who to hire in Abu Dhabi, Dubai, China... 706 00:45:33,920 --> 00:45:39,400 And none of these five want to be off that list. 707 00:45:41,200 --> 00:45:42,960 They worked all over the world. 708 00:45:42,960 --> 00:45:48,200 Their names are recognised, they've done important buildings 709 00:45:48,200 --> 00:45:50,840 and many of them in several continents 710 00:45:50,840 --> 00:45:53,000 and all of them in more than one. 711 00:45:53,000 --> 00:45:56,240 You go where the opportunities arise. 712 00:45:56,240 --> 00:45:59,360 You go where the opportunity is, you really do. 713 00:45:59,360 --> 00:46:04,280 Grimshaw cracked America in a way that no other British architect - 714 00:46:04,280 --> 00:46:07,200 even Norman Foster - has been able to do. 715 00:46:07,200 --> 00:46:13,400 I think some of the things that people associate with our firm, 716 00:46:13,400 --> 00:46:17,920 possibly are particularly British things 717 00:46:17,920 --> 00:46:20,800 and do probably go back 718 00:46:20,800 --> 00:46:24,800 to the times when we were building railways and dams abroad. 719 00:46:24,800 --> 00:46:27,280 There's no doubt that throughout the world, 720 00:46:27,280 --> 00:46:32,360 the British architects of the second half of the 20th century 721 00:46:32,360 --> 00:46:36,000 became identified with Brand UK. 722 00:46:41,960 --> 00:46:45,560 These architects now design on a scale that they never expected 723 00:46:45,560 --> 00:46:49,160 when they started their careers in 1960s Britain. 724 00:46:49,160 --> 00:46:53,520 Farrell's firm, for instance, has built vast stations in China. 725 00:46:56,440 --> 00:46:59,080 China's different. It is on a different scale, 726 00:46:59,080 --> 00:47:02,680 there's one and a quarter billion people there. 727 00:47:02,680 --> 00:47:05,680 Then to design a railway station 728 00:47:05,680 --> 00:47:08,760 which is about three times the size of Waterloo, 729 00:47:08,760 --> 00:47:10,720 is quite mindboggling. 730 00:47:14,120 --> 00:47:18,640 Traditionally, the roof is the biggest element on a building. 731 00:47:18,640 --> 00:47:22,440 At Beijing South, we did have references to the roofs 732 00:47:22,440 --> 00:47:24,880 of the round temples and so on, 733 00:47:24,880 --> 00:47:29,360 which have that curved, indented form of roof, 734 00:47:29,360 --> 00:47:32,280 and that rang bells with them. 735 00:47:32,280 --> 00:47:35,400 But it wasn't, on the other hand, a copy. 736 00:47:37,000 --> 00:47:40,960 Some are squeamish about working with repressive regimes, 737 00:47:40,960 --> 00:47:43,160 architects generally aren't. 738 00:47:43,160 --> 00:47:45,880 I have absolutely no doubt about working in China, 739 00:47:45,880 --> 00:47:51,400 though how you can say that a quarter of the world's population have got it wrong? 740 00:47:52,800 --> 00:47:56,640 To stand on one's dignity ignores the fact that life is complex, 741 00:47:56,640 --> 00:47:59,920 there's huge numbers of good people doing good things 742 00:47:59,920 --> 00:48:02,640 and I think we do a lot wrong ourselves. 743 00:48:02,640 --> 00:48:05,200 You can arrive in Beijing 744 00:48:05,200 --> 00:48:09,480 at a British station or a British airport. 745 00:48:09,480 --> 00:48:12,240 In 2003, Foster + Partners won the job 746 00:48:12,240 --> 00:48:17,640 of creating a suitable gateway for the 2008 Olympics. 747 00:48:17,640 --> 00:48:20,680 You know, they were setting their sights really high. 748 00:48:20,680 --> 00:48:23,840 They wanted the best airport on the planet, 749 00:48:23,840 --> 00:48:26,800 they wanted the biggest airport on the planet, 750 00:48:26,800 --> 00:48:29,280 and they wanted it done in record time. 751 00:48:29,280 --> 00:48:34,480 Norman and I used to attend meetings where this was played back to us 752 00:48:34,480 --> 00:48:37,440 over and over again, and every time it was mentioned, 753 00:48:37,440 --> 00:48:39,560 we were feeling more and more nervous 754 00:48:39,560 --> 00:48:41,440 about what we're taking on here. 755 00:48:50,960 --> 00:48:53,880 The Foster team scaled up the approach they'd first developed 756 00:48:53,880 --> 00:48:58,720 for London Stansted, such as extensive use of natural light. 757 00:48:58,720 --> 00:49:02,840 Like Farrell's station, their design also responded to local context. 758 00:49:03,840 --> 00:49:06,400 The use of the colours in the buildings evokes 759 00:49:06,400 --> 00:49:08,760 the traditional Chinese architecture. 760 00:49:08,760 --> 00:49:13,000 We used 16 shades of red to gold in the building. 761 00:49:16,760 --> 00:49:21,320 At two miles long, with an area of 14 million square feet, 762 00:49:21,320 --> 00:49:24,360 it's a contender for the world's biggest building, 763 00:49:24,360 --> 00:49:29,120 yet it went from first design to completion in barely four years. 764 00:49:29,120 --> 00:49:32,240 This required not only brilliant architects and engineers, 765 00:49:32,240 --> 00:49:36,680 but also the determination of the Chinese State. 766 00:49:38,360 --> 00:49:42,320 I can remember the very first meeting with the client 767 00:49:42,320 --> 00:49:44,960 and we set off doing our presentation about we do this 768 00:49:44,960 --> 00:49:47,600 and we discuss it with you and then it takes some time 769 00:49:47,600 --> 00:49:50,240 to do the drawings and then we do this and we do that. 770 00:49:50,240 --> 00:49:53,720 Um, and after about five minutes, Mr Cheng, our client, 771 00:49:53,720 --> 00:49:56,280 who was a wonderful guy, wonderful guy, 772 00:49:56,280 --> 00:50:00,680 he got up and screamed at me in Mandarin for about two minutes. 773 00:50:00,680 --> 00:50:04,040 And the guy who ran our office in Beijing, is a Chinaman, 774 00:50:04,040 --> 00:50:08,160 he got up and said "OK, Martin, I think we can go now. Meeting's over" 775 00:50:08,160 --> 00:50:11,520 When I got outside I said to Mike "What was that all about?" 776 00:50:11,520 --> 00:50:16,280 And what Mr Cheng had said was, "Listen, fat boy, 777 00:50:16,280 --> 00:50:21,320 "in the last three months, I've moved 400 families off that site 778 00:50:21,320 --> 00:50:23,520 "and I've not shot anybody. 779 00:50:23,520 --> 00:50:27,400 "So, you can do the drawings to the programme I've just outlined." 780 00:50:31,640 --> 00:50:37,240 Beijing Airport, during its construction was heroic. 781 00:50:37,240 --> 00:50:42,320 Um, literally 50,000 people working on site. 782 00:50:42,320 --> 00:50:45,320 It was just...just amazing. 783 00:50:47,760 --> 00:50:51,640 I remember saying "In 13 weeks, we've got as far on Beijing 784 00:50:51,640 --> 00:50:54,960 "as our Terminal 5 team have got in 13 years." 785 00:50:59,560 --> 00:51:02,760 The new terminal at London's Heathrow opened in the same year 786 00:51:02,760 --> 00:51:06,240 as Beijing Airport - 2008. 787 00:51:06,240 --> 00:51:10,680 But Richard Rogers had begun work on its design in 1989. 788 00:51:15,320 --> 00:51:19,320 It was very difficult to build because, as I've learnt slowly, 789 00:51:19,320 --> 00:51:21,480 it's much better to do a job fast. 790 00:51:22,720 --> 00:51:26,760 I mean, basically, it was the longest ever public inquiry, 791 00:51:26,760 --> 00:51:30,840 you know, I think it's a ridiculous way of handling things, 792 00:51:30,840 --> 00:51:34,080 I can say that because I sit in Parliament. 793 00:51:34,080 --> 00:51:35,840 In the end, there has to be a logic, 794 00:51:35,840 --> 00:51:38,880 because the fees of the lawyers and all those involved, 795 00:51:38,880 --> 00:51:42,320 let alone the time, all our time, it's massive over 19 years. 796 00:51:42,320 --> 00:51:44,920 It must be a considerable part of the cost of the airport. 797 00:51:47,680 --> 00:51:52,840 One interpretation might be that it's quicker to get things done in a dictatorship. 798 00:51:53,880 --> 00:52:01,320 If you compare timescales for a project in China with the UK, 799 00:52:01,320 --> 00:52:04,360 and you analyse it, you can look at the time 800 00:52:04,360 --> 00:52:07,200 that is spent to get planning consent. 801 00:52:07,200 --> 00:52:10,760 When you've taken that out and you compare the two, 802 00:52:10,760 --> 00:52:13,400 there is still a massive difference. 803 00:52:14,800 --> 00:52:18,800 So, the speed with which a project can be accomplished 804 00:52:18,800 --> 00:52:21,720 is not because of the political system, 805 00:52:21,720 --> 00:52:25,640 it's not because of an absence of unions or whatever. 806 00:52:25,640 --> 00:52:31,840 It is about the ability to make long-term decisions, 807 00:52:31,840 --> 00:52:37,520 and to think through very, very clearly the wider implications. 808 00:52:37,520 --> 00:52:40,160 We had, I don't know, I'm going to say, 809 00:52:40,160 --> 00:52:43,720 at least probably 10, 15 ministers in charge of us, 810 00:52:43,720 --> 00:52:46,000 we had numerous chief executives, 811 00:52:46,000 --> 00:52:49,960 chairmen and so on and each one carrying his or her ideal 812 00:52:49,960 --> 00:52:53,120 about what an airport is or what we should do. 813 00:52:53,120 --> 00:52:55,960 Of course, because it took nearly 20 years to build, 814 00:52:55,960 --> 00:52:59,360 it changed numerous times, depending on the political situation. 815 00:52:59,360 --> 00:53:02,400 By the end of it, I was really annoyed and I got pretty fed up. 816 00:53:02,400 --> 00:53:05,760 Having said all of that, I rather love it now. 817 00:53:07,800 --> 00:53:10,520 Heathrow's days could be numbered, however, 818 00:53:10,520 --> 00:53:13,840 if this design from Norman Foster were to be taken up. 819 00:53:13,840 --> 00:53:18,640 It's for the Thames Estuary Airport, sometimes dubbed Boris Island. 820 00:53:18,640 --> 00:53:23,480 Rival schemes have been suggested by both Nicholas Grimshaw and Terry Farrell. 821 00:53:23,480 --> 00:53:26,040 What draws all of them into public debate 822 00:53:26,040 --> 00:53:28,880 is the scale at which they now work and think. 823 00:53:28,880 --> 00:53:31,120 It's inevitable the more buildings you do, 824 00:53:31,120 --> 00:53:33,400 the bigger the buildings you do, 825 00:53:33,400 --> 00:53:36,000 the more you need to get into infrastructure. 826 00:53:37,720 --> 00:53:41,360 These men have worked all their lives for a better designed world, 827 00:53:41,360 --> 00:53:44,840 and that's still what fires them up. 828 00:53:44,840 --> 00:53:46,920 Terry Farrell has just completed a major review 829 00:53:46,920 --> 00:53:50,480 of architecture for the British government. 830 00:53:50,480 --> 00:53:54,520 While this is what Norman Foster's been working on lately - 831 00:53:54,520 --> 00:53:57,000 the new headquarters for Apple. 832 00:53:57,000 --> 00:53:59,080 For him, this temple to technology 833 00:53:59,080 --> 00:54:01,400 has its origins in his earliest work, 834 00:54:01,400 --> 00:54:03,800 which combined innovative engineering 835 00:54:03,800 --> 00:54:05,840 and a progressive social agenda. 836 00:54:05,840 --> 00:54:08,960 If it's 2013 and it's Apple, 837 00:54:08,960 --> 00:54:16,000 it's the same concerns going right back to 1967, 838 00:54:16,000 --> 00:54:20,800 it's creating one building that brings everybody together, 839 00:54:20,800 --> 00:54:24,960 and it's also about pushing the technology to new levels. 840 00:54:24,960 --> 00:54:27,400 In that sense, nothing's changed. 841 00:54:29,720 --> 00:54:35,240 Richard Rogers turned 80 in 2013, the others aren't far behind. 842 00:54:35,240 --> 00:54:39,680 None of them show signs of retiring any time soon. 843 00:54:39,680 --> 00:54:44,000 I don't feel a practice has a beginning and an end, 844 00:54:44,000 --> 00:54:46,560 and a mission accomplished. 845 00:54:46,560 --> 00:54:48,320 People say, "When are you going to retire?" 846 00:54:48,320 --> 00:54:52,160 and I said, "But you want to retire TO something. I haven't got something I want to retire to." 847 00:54:52,160 --> 00:54:55,040 I have every intention of going to 101. 848 00:54:55,040 --> 00:54:59,000 Um, to... There's a lot left to do. 849 00:54:59,000 --> 00:55:02,400 I'm going to keep going as long as I can. 850 00:55:02,400 --> 00:55:05,440 If I'm enjoying life and I'm enjoying architecture 851 00:55:05,440 --> 00:55:08,240 and I'm as stimulated as I am now, 852 00:55:08,240 --> 00:55:11,400 why would I want to stop? 853 00:55:17,080 --> 00:55:18,760 Those five men, between them, 854 00:55:18,760 --> 00:55:22,760 have had such an enormous impact on architecture. 855 00:55:22,760 --> 00:55:25,400 I think they've demonstrated that architecture 856 00:55:25,400 --> 00:55:27,680 can be politically powerful, 857 00:55:27,680 --> 00:55:29,520 financially powerful, 858 00:55:29,520 --> 00:55:31,280 culturally powerful. 859 00:55:31,280 --> 00:55:33,880 They're one of our greatest exports, and yeah, 860 00:55:33,880 --> 00:55:36,320 it makes me feel quite patriotic just thinking about it! 861 00:55:36,320 --> 00:55:38,680 SHE CHUCKLES 862 00:55:38,680 --> 00:55:42,480 It's a shame they're all men. Well, I guess it's generational. 863 00:55:42,480 --> 00:55:45,600 These five architects are the most significant 864 00:55:45,600 --> 00:55:47,640 in British architectural history, 865 00:55:47,640 --> 00:55:51,640 certainly since the Arts and Crafts architects were in their heyday. 866 00:55:51,640 --> 00:55:55,040 Before then, you'd have to go back to Wren and Hawksmoor. 867 00:55:59,560 --> 00:56:03,200 High-Tech can be assured of its place in architectural history, 868 00:56:03,200 --> 00:56:06,800 and in some ways, has already passed into it. 869 00:56:06,800 --> 00:56:12,160 40 years on, the earliest High-Tech buildings are now period pieces. 870 00:56:18,760 --> 00:56:22,040 Norman Foster's Willis Faber building in Ipswich, 871 00:56:22,040 --> 00:56:26,120 which was the first really modern building to be listed Grade I. 872 00:56:26,120 --> 00:56:29,000 At that moment, the High-Tech movement 873 00:56:29,000 --> 00:56:31,280 became a historical artefact. 874 00:56:33,720 --> 00:56:37,280 These structures were conceived of as a kit of parts, 875 00:56:37,280 --> 00:56:41,120 lightweight, adaptable and impermanent. 876 00:56:41,120 --> 00:56:43,960 But the irony is, since they were first built, 877 00:56:43,960 --> 00:56:46,400 they've mostly stayed just the way they were. 878 00:56:46,400 --> 00:56:48,160 As soon as a building becomes historic 879 00:56:48,160 --> 00:56:51,160 and is seen as being significant, you are not allowed to change it. 880 00:56:51,160 --> 00:56:54,040 The Pompidou Centre was meant to be super adaptable 881 00:56:54,040 --> 00:56:56,600 and you were meant to be able to pull bits out, plug bits in... 882 00:56:56,600 --> 00:56:59,520 It got crystallised as it was. 883 00:56:59,520 --> 00:57:00,920 That's the strange thing, 884 00:57:00,920 --> 00:57:03,440 even a High-Tech building becomes a monument. 885 00:57:03,440 --> 00:57:07,160 You look at the Pompidou Centre and it reminds us of the 1970s. 886 00:57:10,520 --> 00:57:15,840 It turned out the most enduring feature of this architecture wasn't its functionality. 887 00:57:15,840 --> 00:57:20,480 It was the promise it made of utopia, delivered through technology, 888 00:57:20,480 --> 00:57:25,160 and that's a promise some of us still want to believe in. 889 00:57:25,160 --> 00:57:29,640 High-Tech architecture is a sort of permanent model 890 00:57:29,640 --> 00:57:31,240 of a vision of the future. 891 00:57:31,240 --> 00:57:34,400 They're buildings that still say, "We've a chance". 892 00:57:34,400 --> 00:57:38,760 High-Tech posits the idea that there is such a thing as progress. 893 00:57:38,760 --> 00:57:43,720 Unless you're an optimist, you would never contemplate 894 00:57:43,720 --> 00:57:47,160 the uphill task of designing and realising a building. 895 00:57:51,200 --> 00:57:56,840 It's a belief in the power of a building, an environment, 896 00:57:56,840 --> 00:57:59,800 to significantly improve the quality of life. 897 00:58:13,600 --> 00:58:16,320 You can learn more about iconic British designs 898 00:58:16,320 --> 00:58:17,840 and the people behind them 899 00:58:17,840 --> 00:58:22,160 with the Open University's interactive Building Stories. 900 00:58:22,160 --> 00:58:25,280 Go to... 901 00:58:25,280 --> 00:58:28,280 and follow the links to the Open University.