In our CONVOCO! Podcast Corinne M. Flick speaks with Sir David Chipperfield, architect and founder of Fundación RIA, about:
What Does the New Century Require from Architecture?
Here’s what he said:
The role of the architect has been somewhat diminished over the last 30 or 40 years. In the 1960s and 1970s architects were engaged in building housing, universities, and social infrastructure. More recently we have reflected the general tendency of society, which has been driven by investment and consumerism.
The priorities for what we build have to be revised. Today, the success of cities is measured by the success of their centres as commercial tools. We no longer measure their liveability.
We [the British] are an enterprise culture. We don’t like to put limits on enterprises. And that is the reason for Brexit. Brexit is an attempt to escape regulation.
What we need now is more regulation in terms of the environment and protecting parts of the community. It is not going to come from the market.
Proximity pulls down barriers and pulls down prejudices. When you know people you can’t build prejudices in the same way.
We [architects] have a societal potential to link together communities.
Stakeholders working together is not going to come from politics but from the commercial world understanding that there is power in a new way of thinking.