Created in Birmingham

Birmingham: Shaping the City is a new book published by RIBA about our fair city written by Ben Flatman after years of research. The photographic editor was Craig Holmes who took photos at the launch night. Here’s the blurb:

“Birmingham: Shaping the City” is an authoritative and objective assessment of the redevelopment and regeneration of Birmingham. It tells the story of how Joseph Chamberlain’s grand Victorian city was almost obliterated due to an infatuation with the car and how a belated but vital reassessment took place at his home, Highbury in 1988, leading to arguably the most dramatic transformation of any city in the country. It is also the story of hugely ambitious projects, often implemented in the face of great opposition, driven by a rediscovery of Chamberlain’s unique brand of city entrepreneurialism.The book seeks to identify the drivers for change in the renaissance of contemporary Birmingham following its evolution from Victorian times and explores the depth and complexity of the public-private partnerships involved in the delivery structures and their achievements. Using unique case studies that illustrate the processes involved in the major physical change of the city, it assesses their influence on planned future projects. The book articulates and stresses the importance of urban design for successful regeneration in this ever-changing city.

“Birmingham: Shaping the City” will make a lasting contribution to city’s collective consciousness and make available, for the first time, a coherent narrative of where the city has come from and where it may be going in both a written and visual form.

While the credentials of the contributors are impeccable I’d be interested to hear what others think of it. Available soon from Amazon and presumably in the RIBA bookshop on Margaret St.

Andy at Substrakt wonders, what’s up with Eastiside? Considering he works there and has friends who live there he’s surprised to realise he doesn’t know exactly what’s going to happen with the redevelopment. So he digs around online and finds… not much really.

On the one hand this isn’t too surprising. The Eastside development is a pretty massive project with loads of companies and government departments involved so tying it all together at a granular level would be a nightmare. But if you’re just interested in the broader strokes it would be handy to have some kind of website that brings together all the developer sketches and so on into one place.

Something like, say, Manchester’s New Islington site, as suggested by Andy. Only a little less c-r-a-z-y please.

I can’t think of anything for Eastside. Does it exist? Should the council (or whatever body is overseeing the whole project) do one? Is that an unreasonable request? If it is, does anyone want to start a blog on it? I suspect the AdSense revenue would be pretty good on something like that… Let me know if you need a hand setting it up.

Photo by Dr King Bertt. Click on it for details.

[Update: My mistake - it’s running until Feb 29th.]

Model Cities was a neat sounding exhibition currently on at M.A.D.E. of photos from the Model Buildings project run by Stans Cafe at St Albans School last year before it was rebuilt. The children were encouraged to imagine “that small details of the old school were architectural features of the new school” using tiny people.

The exhibition finished yesterday (oops) but is on until Feb 29th (Here’s the flyer) and you can find out more about the Delicate Balance collection of seventeen projects here.

I also love this little film they made at the end, so much so I uploaded it to YouTube on their behalf. ;)

The Birmingham Architecture Association are running a monthly series of six talks at the Old Joint Stock Theatre on the theme of “What does it mean to be a Second City?”

Is it important to be second? The BAA lecture series seeks to explore the different aspects of ’second city’ and how this affects the built environment, and the role that architects can play in shaping it.

Speakers are asked to present their views about, and experiences of, working in and with second cities - and the influence this may have on their work approach. Do second cities have a different attitude to design? Is it seen to be more or less important?

The first is with Julian Weyer of C F Moller who come out of Arhus, Denmark’s second city, on January 29th. This starts a trend with speakers from Wroclaw (Poland’s second city) and Milan (Italy’s second city) along with our own Glenn Howells and others following over the months.

The big premise - that we’re in competition with Manchester for a crown the use of which is debatable - has been somewhat done to death but as a gateway to exploring how cities like Birmingham, which are certainly “second tier” to the Londons and New Yorks of the world, can find an identity I think this could be very interesting. I’m particularly interested in what we can learn from Milan, for example.

Here’s the PDF with details of all the talks, and by golly, their Events Page has an RSS feed! How progressive!

via the Conservation Trust blog who got it from no2self, an architect’s blog I’ll be keeping tabs on.

I’ve written about Silent UK on my own blog but coming across his/their Deviant Art profile (courtesy, as ever, of D’log) made me realise I’d not brought him/them to your attention.

What’s going on here is urban exploration where folks gain entry, usually illegally, into abandoned buildings, underground tunnels and other areas not usually visited and make a record. Silent UK in particular takes the most wonderful photos and a fair few of them are in Birmingham. Like this one.

At some point I’m going to get off my arse, get a pair of waders and start doing this myself, but in the meanwhile it’s great to see others recording our hidden architectural heritage (though, unlike that above ground, it’s unlikely to suffer the trials of regeneration.)

One for the built environment buffs - Revealing the Town Hall is a talk given by Anthony Peers at, yes, the Town Hall this Saturday Sunday afternoon. “Anthony has been researching the history of the building for close to a decade and was involved in the planning of the recently completed scheme of repairs and improvements.” News comes via Chris at About Brum who also provides the lovely panoramic photo I nabbed for this post. Click on it for the massive version.

Holding the Edge is an Artists Placement scheme run by MADE in association with the council.

Four emerging Birmingham based artists have been working with MADE in Eastside during 2007 as part of an Artists Placement funded by Birmingham City Council’s Equal II: The Last Mile programme and Arts & Business. The outcomes of their placement will be presented as an alternative prospectus for Eastside titled ‘Holding the Edge’ curated by Anna Douglas shown at MADE, 122 Fazeley St, Birmingham from 19-27 October 2007.

The four artists Rob Colbourne, Stuart Mugridge, Nicole Slater Hunt and Stuart Whipps are fervent about the future of Eastside and their propositions draw attention to the area’s diverse past, present dormancy and future potential.

Rob Colbourne worked with Birmingham City Council on their bid for the new city park in Eastside.
Stuart Mugridge worked with Knight Frank Land Valuers looking at the Curzon Street Park site.
Nicole Slater Hunt worked with the Festival of Xtreme Building on their radical proposals for the re-invention of public space.
Stuart Whipps worked with Kinetic AIU Architects on ISIS Waterside Regeneration’s Warwick Bar development.

More info in this Word doc.

The project is being launched on Friday at the Spotted Dog pub in Digbeth in the form of a pub quiz with artists and council bods making up two of the teams.

According to The Stirrer plans were revealed by the Council for the new Central Library building this weekend. Costing £193 million it will sit next to and incorporate the REP theatre in Centenary Square creating a “a new centre for learning and culture.” (Hang on, isn’t that what Eastside’s supposed to be?) Along with a shared entrance this will also give the REP a new mid-sized auditorium.

And Here’s the BCC page with all the details and a nice picture.

This shows “how Centenary Square could look in the future, following completion of the Library of Birmingham development (indicated in red), Arena Central and the redevelopment of Paradise Circus.” It’s expected to be completed in 2013 and “boost and consolidate the continued regeneration of the city centre’s Westside and the improvement of Centenary Square.”

The closing party for the Festival of Xtreme Building takes place this Friday at 9pm on the FXB site.

A pretty low key for everyone that has been involved to see the site looking very pretty at night lit up, listen to some music and have a beer. The Ale Installation by Pam Ginn will be on site for those of you that missed the Ale Exhibition at MADE, a performance by Polar Foam, and a few drums.

The Mud Hut at the Festival of Xtreme Building site was featured on Radio 4’s PM today (about 15 mins in to this clip). They’re building a sustainable house out of mud bricks over the next week and anyone can take part.

I’m posting this without comment because I’m kinda speechless. In a positive way though.

VTP 200 site

The Stirrer is very impressed.

Stirrer forum thread.

BiNS is mildly sarcastic.

Nothing in the mainstream press yet.

A scale model will be at Millennium Point from Saturday.

Wow. Just wow.

Architect and Urban Designer Joe Holyoak has been uploading a load of articles onto his blog. Always good reading.

Concreation, the group who really like brutalist concrete architecture, are doing an art trail around the library over the Artsfest weekend. Here’s the original brief for the show.

A rather cryptic event from the Festival of Xtreme Building this Saturday:

Pudelskern arrive in Birmingham City Centre saturday 11th August with their Space Programme Furniture suitable for all planet.

The Austrian art collective promise to “bring some flowers from the Austrian alps to the Heart of England” along with “spaceship, performers, light installations, a parallel universe, sculptures and structures” at venues yet to be announced…

Then on Monday The Paper House arrives on site.

The Paper House structure was originally made for one of Sozos’ previous projects (The X Ray factory, Live Work) from recycled junk mail that had been posted through [artist Peter Hadfiled’s] letterbox.

The Festival of Extreme Building has recreated the beautiful aesthetic of the Paper House but adapting it to with stand the rigours of outdoor exposure.

Although no longer adhering to the original ethos of sustainable recycling it stands up for the idea and we hope it will become a debating point around the issue of green technologies.

The Church like structure is fabricated from wire mesh filled with high quality polystyrene foam balls.

Volunteers are needed to help put it together starting on the 13th. Contact claire@festival-xtremebuilding.org.uk or just turn up on the FXB site.

Ale Installation is a show running at the MADE gallery on Fazeley St (map) until 2nd August. There’s a private view tomorrow (Thursday) at 6pm.

Pamela Ginn’s tribute to the real ale heritage of the region was developed in conjunction with the Festival of Xtreme Building. A mixed media installation, Ale recreates the sights, sounds and smell of the brewery through yards of tubing, a traditional cask and a hand pump through which visitors can pull their own pint of real ale.

Ale is designed to truly engage the viewer, and was inspired both by the artist’s desire to recreate the social interaction of the traditional public house and also by her wish to avoid the situation she has witnessed many times, where ‘private view’ audiences fail to interact with the art being exhibited.

The exhibition will be lined with photography from Highgate Brewery one of the oldest Victorian tower breweries in the country; a beautiful building that represents the pivotal role that breweries once had at the heart of the community.

I’m lead to believe there will be real ale, pork pies, cheese and Branston Pickle at the view…

The View Finder is the latest project to appear at the Festival of Xtreme Building site on Moor St Queensway.

The View Finder is the result of a collaborative process between an architect Will Schofield of Glenn Howells, five schools and the community of Sheldon.

Visitors who seek to enter the inside will discover that the walls are precisely pierced to provide selected views of Birmingham city centre.

The views that are afforded through the solid have been chosen by children from Sheldon and are the result of collaborative work with Sheldon Heath Community arts college, Mapledene primary school, Stanville primary School. Brays school and James Brindley school.

I saw the collaboration in progress when I visited the site last month where groups of kids were picking out their views. One interesting side effect of this is you’ll see Birmingham from the perspective of a 4ft high person.

The launch is this Saturday at 1pm when Clive Scott’s Muvuca Samba Band will be performing. That link has tunes!

Also worth noting that the FXB website has been updated and is now written in English rather than the unfortunate funding-speak it was blighted with before, thus more accurately reflecting the style and manner of its envisioner Dave Pollard (but with less swearing). Also, they’re always looking for volunteers. This pretty much involves hanging around the site talking to the public about the exhibits, amongst other things.

Nunovo’s reflections on Tunnel Vision

On my return to the surface, I noted the standard city sounds with a sense of appreciation, hearing them as rhythmic ambient features of the sonic landscape. It’s not every day that the grind and roar of an approaching bus becomes an interesting element of installation art, or that the din of traffic, people, and other street sounds washes across the senses as a wave. This is probably the best thing I can say about Tunnel Vision. It didn’t reveal or animate subterranean architecture so much as it rearranged my perception of aboveground soundscapes.

Photos.

BBC Birmingham has photos from Tunnel Vision

© BBC presumably

If you didn’t already know it runs until next Sunday.

Probably easiest just to post the flyer for this one. Click for more details.

The Natural House project comes to Birmingham this week demonstrating the Clay Build Technique as part of Architecture Week. “CBT is modern, sustainable and carbon neutral technique of building houses / buildings using primary materials such as, clay, straw and water.” In other words mud huts, and you get a chance to make them at the Festival of Xtreme Building site on Moor St Queensway this week.

The dates and times for workshops are as follows:

20,21,23,24 June
Each session runs for 1 3/4 hrs.
Session one 10am – 11.45am
Session two 12pm – 1.45pm
Session three 2.15pm – 4pm.

I say again, this workshop involves actually building stuff out of mud.