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In defending his plan for hundreds of thousands of new houses, many of them on green countryside, Planning Minister Nick Boles argues that “the built environment can be more beautiful than nature” (Ugly housing blamed for shortfall, BD 30 November). Judging by the mass protests now flooding the popular media, new developments will have to be that if they are to survive local obstruction! To overcome such opposition we will (a) have to find consultation methods that fully draw most local people into the formation of major new development plans – not just 5% or 10% , as is the case with ‘Design charrettes’ and ‘Enquiry by Design’, though the latter may have a role; and (b) solve the problem of how to achieve a high degree of beauty in hundreds of thousands of new buildings, when very few of these could be individually designed.

On the first issue, may I suggest that the easiest and most effective consultation method would be for the local planning authority, assisted by expert organisations such as the RIBA, DesignCouncil/Cabe, and the Prince’s Foundation, to select a range of existing examples of architectural excellence, broadly comparable to the proposed development in terms of density etc, which cover all styles and characters from high-rise to low-rise, from ‘classical vernacular’ to ‘cutting-edge modern’, etc; and then to invite local people to narrow down the choice to the few best-liked options by marking a simple questionnaire. In a particular case one of the ‘traditional’ exemplars might for instance be Wick Village, Hackney Wick, London E9 (Levitt Bernstein); a ‘modernised traditional’ exemplar might be Bernie Spain Gardens in the Coin Street development, Duchy Street, London SE1 (Lifschutz Davidson); and so on across the architectural spectrum. If bidding developers knew the preferences of local people before hiring an architect, and knew that planning permission would be eased by respecting these preferences, we could greatly reduce the number of hated new developments, and create new towns people actually love. And because all of the guiding exemplars had been specifically selected for being excellent of their kind, architectural excellence would be assured – no need for purists to bang on about second-rate ‘pastiche’ etc.

On the second issue, as half a million (or whatever) new houses cannot possibly be individually designed, it is urgently necessary to develop, again assisted by the organisations above, standard house types of various sizes and types that (a) are technically excellent, and (b) are regarded by the public as beautiful, to help developers achieve large-scale excellence at moderate cost. As your leader Bold may not be beautiful (2 December 2011) correctly argued: “an urbanism based on standard house types has every possibility of being rich and sustainable”, and Ellis Woodman’s participation in the Prince’s Foundation competition for “a family house with traditional design elements that would look beautiful in a street of similar houses” (News, BD 2 August 2012) is a welcome step in the right direction.

If realised, the Government’s house-building plans will transform the appearance of this country, and we owe it to future generations to get this right. The first step, now, must be a programme to test the widest possible variety of ideas and procedures in all of the above matters.

Maritz Vandenberg

[Author:
AN INCLUSIVE ENVIRONMENT (Butterworth-Heinemann 2008)
FARNSWORTH HOUSE: MIES VAN DER ROHE (Phaidon 2003)
etc etc].