by appleofglasgow » Thu May 10, 2012 9:20 pm
Copcutt was a visionary, from the little excerpts we have of him post-Cumbernauld, you could tell that he blames its overall failure on the fact that he seen Cumbernauld as a 10 piece jigsaw with only the edge pieces in place.
Even if he had his way though, I doubt Cumbernauld would see appreciation.
You only have to look at the Tricorn centre in Portsmouth, which was a not dissimilar construction that eventually succumbed to the modern hate for concrete.
Problem is its highly unfashionable to appreciate any architecture from about 1955 onwards. Concrete is associated with run down, depressing, dumps and deprivation.
There are only a select few, and I'm not being a snob or by any means up myself when I say that, that can see that Cumbernauld with some TLC and a fresh outlook could be stripped back to the important Copcutt led section, the section that won a worldwide architecture award. It has been said, that such a structure in a mainland European country would have been gutted and rennovated by now.
Sadly though, I can see the countdown clock ticking for what remains of Phase 1 (as I sadly forget that an extremely large percentage of what Copcutt did achieve, was demolished to make way for a biege wall in the form of the Antonine...people never learn).
Ryan