Book review: 100 21st-Century Buildings by the Twentieth Century Society

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Batsford Books’ new publication records an impressive range of buildings from the past quarter-century that are likely to be seen as significant in the future and contextualises them with punchy reviews and erudite essays, writes Ben Tosland

100 21st century buildings cover screenshot

21st Century Buildings by the Twentieth Century Society is published by Batsford. The cover image is of A House for Essex, a collaboration between the artist Grayson Perry and Charles Holland of Fat Architecture, on the banks of the Stour estuary

100 21st Century Buildings achieves something quite difficult: it provides a list of a hundred worthy and highly regarded buildings while contextualising them with punchy reviews and erudite, contrasting essays. It records the buildings that might later become heritage, while exposing the difficulty of making that judgment in today’s world.

Batsford Books have championed 20th-century heritage through their publications in association with the Twentieth Century Society for over a decade. In that time, their books have come to provide useful first drafts of history and significance in relation to a number of building ages and types that otherwise might go under appreciated. Initially led by the late Elain Harwood, the yellow bound Post-War Listed Buildings is an iconic must-reference for any heritage professional or architect seeking to place post-war buildings within their context.

To have the frontispiece as a “loser” sends a message that contemporary critical reception is not the only metric 21st-century buildings should be judged by

100 21st Century Buildings’ cover features the Charles Holland (then of FAT Architecture) designed House for Essex, which famously did not get a look in in the RIBA’s regional awards that year. When drafting a list of buildings that are likely to be considered “heritage” or worthy of listing, to have the frontispiece as a “loser” sends a message that contemporary critical reception is not the only metric 21st-century buildings should be judged by.

The book, as its title suggests, features 100 individual buildings and is structured by period (2000-04, 2005-09, 2010-14, and 2020-25). These are interspersed with four essays from key contributors and observers of architecture through this period, as well as an introduction from the longstanding C20 director, Catherine Croft. She notes that not one 21st-century building is listed in England, but those which are found in the book are potentially worthy candidates of being anointed with claims to heritage value.

1/6

Of the essays, Andrea Placidi – co-editor of Bloomsbury’s Understanding the Maggie’s Centres: An Architecture of Care – writes about the mission of the cancer and how spaces can influence care, while Hans Ulrich Obrist sits down with the editors to discuss the temporary Serpentine Pavilions constructed annually at the Serpentine Gallery.

Both series of buildings, undeniably, show trends in architecture of the period, with the inaugural Serpentine Pavilion commissioned in 2000. The first Maggie’s Centre, famously, was drawn up by Maggie Keswick, Charles Jencks, and Maggie’s nurse, Dame Laura Lee, with the building’s completion in 1996 – this year being its 30th anniversary.

The two series represent very different models of commissioning: while the Serpentine Pavilions are relatively free from the conventional demands of a permanent client, Maggie’s Centres are shaped precisely by the needs of cancer patients and their proximity to hospitals. Placidi ends the essay opining on the work of the architects involved (a who’s who of 21st-century practices) who have created “inspiring, remarkable places” that are often considered the best in their oeuvre of work.

Barnabas Calder’s essay is framed as a riposte to the buildings that are being celebrated. And while Calder can enjoy the spaces and structures of this century, there is an unmissable tone of anxiety to the piece.

The Leadenhall Building, the Shard, the Gherkin and LSE’s Marshall Building are all featured within the 100 buildings. Calder calls them out as being projects which have made “substantial, avoidable contributions to ecosystem collapse”, while also accepting that they are “alarmingly representative of much architectural production in the UK”.

While Calder’s piece encourages reflection on what has been, Hugh Pearman’s essay tries to make sense of what is arguably the most pluralistic period for architectural production in the history of the profession. The range of examples is itself the argument.

There is impressive range, with the collection avoiding any one singular trope or restriction to a specific group of architects or building typology. Key architects appear time and again…

Neo-gothic architecture, a school designed by Future Systems, and a Liverpool terraced row transformed by Assemble all sit within the same period without belonging to a single recognisable movement. It also features arguments on tall buildings and their presence in cities both as residential tower and commercial.

But what of the 100 buildings themselves? There is impressive range, with the collection avoiding any one singular trope or restriction to a specific group of architects or building typology. Key architects appear time and again (notably Foster + Parters and RSHP). The book does not shun commercial developers either, with Countryside’s Accordia scheme in Cambridge considered.

A number of temporary structures (Clerkenwell’s Cinerolleum and a Room for London, which was perched on the Queen Elizabeth Hall at the Southbank Centre) are included, and while these (like the Serpentine Pavilion series) might no longer exist, it is important to note that their existence testifies to the development of design during this period, much like Bruno Taut’s Glasshouse did for modernism. London’s Olympic legacy is well covered with the velodrome and aquatics centre featured which have reconfigured an entire part of east London.

100 21st Century Buildings provides a first draft of buildings which are likely to be seen as significant in the future. Each one, that still exists and does so in completeness, shows early indication of holding heritage value. The arguments presented in the essays are comfortable bedfellows with their subject, capturing the period’s architectural zeitgeist, the concerns of its tastemakers and, most importantly, the climate crisis that increasingly complicates the celebration of contemporary architecture.