Design Project no. 24 – A Market Entrance

When I teach Classical Architecture, I try to avoid any discussion of modernism in class. As a promoter of classical and traditional architecture you might think that critiquing modernism would be a natural part of the learning process. What I’ve found however is that once the topic of modernism is brought up, the classroom mood changes and a negativity creeps in that is difficult to dispel. In the past, my students have come from a broad variety of backgrounds, but the effect of merely mentioning modernism has always been the same, whether the class is made up of architects, students or amateur enthusiasts.

_{An initial 10 minute series of sketches that included a thumbnail for what was to become the Market Gate}

My latest design project started as a very small sketch on a page of many small sketches that I drew up in less than ten minutes. I just seemed to be in right mood and these ideas flowed out from my pencil unincumbered. It occurred to me later on that the right mood and the right feeling was the key. The emotional state that allows such easy creativity is delicate and difficult to pin down. It’s also very hard to reproduce, but the one thing I know for sure is that it is somehow linked to an absence of negativity.

On a recent visit to University College Cork with my twelve-year old son, we crossed the river Lee using the new Cavanagh Bridge from Fitzgerald Park to the main campus. As a former employee of UCC I know the campus very well and wanted to see this new bridge. What I didn’t quite expect though was the visceral anger and disgust this new structure provoked in me because of how utterly it degraded and vandalised its’ once serene riverside setting. I expected that the design would not be to my taste, but as a multi award-winning design by one of Ireland’s most celebrated architectural teams I thought I might find something of interest. I could not have been more mistaken.

Criticising this individual bridge in detail would be a waste of energy, but what was interesting to me was just how triggering it was. It’s the same feeling I try to avoid in my class and my students. In my class it’s relatively easy to deflect, but how do we avoid being triggered by a piece of essential infrastructure like a bridge?

There is no more triggering environment than social media, but here again it is relatively easy to tune out. I tend to avoid the more aggressive online criticisms of modernism; not because I don’t agree with them but because they actually make it more difficult to be positive about the solutions. Put it this way, when I want to start a new classical composition, I find it best to prime my mind by concentrating on traditional precedents and avoiding modernism at all costs.

There is no subtle way to say this other than stating the fact that I find modernism to be toxic for my mental health. Simply being in the precence of modernism makes me feel physically ill, and like an allergy, my immune system deals with modernism with an exaggerated version of how most people naturally react. Also it’s a toxicity that I may be especially sensitive to, as the scars that architectural education inflicted on my mental health when I was a student over 20 years ago have never healed properly.

Unless you have been trained to react otherwise, modernist architecture makes us feel bad on a very profound level and that bad feeling has a way of perpetuating itself. It is a feeling that can be infectious and viral, and is perfectly suited to the era of social media because of how it inspires a cascade of attention and outrage. The more outrage and division that is triggered by a design, the more successful is it deemed to be. This can be clearly seen by the kinds of buildings that are deemed award-worthy and the kinds of architectural firms that tend to dominate the industry.

We can all see that most new architecture being built today is pretty bad but the more triggering and more insidious the design, the more likely the architectural media is going to celebrate it, especially if the “concept” can be spun and sold in a particularly creative way. This is the secret to winning architectural awards; in reality they are not awards for architecture at all, they are awards for creative spin. This approach then becomes the one to emulate; these award-winners become the leaders that young architects look up to, and so the vortex of architectural abasement continues.

The most obvious way to move beyond the influence of modernism would be to ignore it. It’s amazing how by visiting a beautiful place, toxic negativity is purged and it’s so much easier to imagine a more hopeful architectural culture. Unfortunately, it’s rarely so easy to tune out if you have to live in a modernist structure or have it in your surrounding environment. In cases like this, modernism acts like an parasitic and infectious plague, ultimately leading to its’ own eventual demise unless it can find another host.

The other part of the cure is the practice and promotion of a healthier and holistic culture of architecture. When I design something like the Market Gate shown here, I find it fulfilling and satisfying on an almost spiritual level. It seems to give me more natural resistance to the negative influence of modernism when I have the positive endorphins of classicism flowing through my brain. Boosting my natural immune system with beauty, joy and hope in this way has helped me to heal.

I know that I’m not the most talented architect or draftsman and that my designs will never be built. I know only too well that the opportunity for me to have any kind of meaningful career in architecture is long gone. But I also know that I must continue to compose classical architectrue for my mental health and resist any kind of recognition. And so for as long as I’m able to draw and to see I will continue.

Criticism of Modernism is justified and worthy but remember that it thrives on ever increasing levels of attention and outrage so just don’t give it the satisfaction by allowing it to trigger you; “fighting” modernism just feeds the beast. Instead try to concentrate on the positivity of the traditional architectural culture around you, a culture that has been proven to inspire countless generations of ordinary people to become greater than the sum of their parts.

_{Developing the sketch into a technical drawing is possibly my favourite part of the design process}

_{Analyising the proportional relationships in this way shown above often highlights opportunities to improve the composition}

_{The final “presentation” drawing is the part I find most daunting as I don’t consider myself a great draftsman. I would be quite happy to farm out this part!}