More Comment – Page 308

  • Gehry: Back on track in Abu Dhabi.
    Opinion

    Concrete Boots

    2006-07-14T00:00:00Z

    This week in brief by Concrete Boots …

  • Opinion

    Broken rules mean harm to industry

    2006-07-14T00:00:00Z

    I would like to correct BD’s news story “Murphy upset over best coming second” (News July 7).

  • Opinion

    But client is happy

    2006-07-14T00:00:00Z

    The Royal Incorporation of Architects in Scotland-approved selection process was not a design competition, it was a combined quality and price process, with 70% score awarded to quality (of which only part was for design) and 30% score for price.

  • Opinion

    Exam stress

    2006-07-14T00:00:00Z

    I’ve now reviewed the examination record sheet for part I and part II that a candidate from our office was given after her interview for UK accreditation with Arb (“Arb group to review foreign accreditation”, News June 30).

  • Opinion

    Answer is simple

    2006-07-14T00:00:00Z

    Charles Edwards (Letters July 7) asks why, as someone who lacks qualifications recognised by Arb, he must undertake its examination when his German colleague with a qualification recognised under the Architects’ Directive does not . The answer is straightforward.

  • Opinion

    President Prasad

    2006-07-14T00:00:00Z

    The coverage over the third (BNP) candidate for the RIBA presidency has drowned out any debate between the two front runners, Valerie Owen and Sunand Prasad.

  • Opinion

    Poptastic planner

    2006-07-14T00:00:00Z

    Philip Watson explains how his full grant subsidised his fledgling music career (Letters July 7).

  • Opinion

    Virtual verdicts

    2006-07-14T00:00:00Z

    Software solutions have emerged to help architects test their facades against revised Part L. BDP’s Chris Yates takes a look ‘under the bonnet’

  • Opinion

    I was there at non-riot meeting

    2006-07-07T00:00:00Z

    I read your article “Phillips-induced riot fails to materialise” (News June 30) with interest. Far from being absent from the council meeting, I attended all the business items and presented three finance papers, including the 2005 annual accounts which show record turnover and profits under my stewardship as hon treasurer ...

  • Opinion

    Rural elitists

    2006-07-07T00:00:00Z

    Our policy director, Nicholas Boles, finds the CPRE’s attack on Policy Exchange (News June 30) unwarranted. As its report shows, just 11% of England is urbanised, our houses are old, expensive and small, and people are increasingly being made to live in flats — points Policy Exchange has been making ...

  • Opinion

    Sheffield fledgling

    2006-07-07T00:00:00Z

    I was disappointed to learn that the head of architecture at Sheffield University believes that “...there is no real connection between architecture and rock music” (Soapbox June 23). I studied at Sheffield from 1983 to 1990 and can recall no fewer than three bands led by architecture students that regularly ...

  • Opinion

    Dublin rats

    2006-07-07T00:00:00Z

    While studying architectural technology in Bolton Street (now Dublin School of Architecture at DIT) in the early seventies, two of my classmates, Gerry Cott and Pete Cusask, teamed up with Sir Bob to form the Boomtown Rats. I never knew what Geldof actually studied — he was just there!I ...

  • Opinion

    Arb exam unfair

    2006-07-07T00:00:00Z

    Further to George Oldham’s letter about the “pointless exam” (June 16), I must say that I concur with his comments and the efforts of the Arb reform group.As an illustration of the absurdity, I am working with a German designer (nice chap), who by virtue of coming from an EU ...

  • Opinion

    Quality cast

    2006-07-07T00:00:00Z

    Michael Hickey’s letter (June 30) about a legitimate name for high-quality aggregate precast concrete has got the generic name wrong. “Cast masonry” is a name I invented in the mid-nineties and have been spreading through the industry ever since. It arose in a conversation with Philip Dowson and Richard ...

  • Opinion

    Welsh win would send wrong message

    2006-07-07T00:00:00Z

    There will be several eyebrows raised this week over the inclusion, for the third year running, of a road on the shortlist for the prime minister’s better public building award.

  • Opinion

    So what are we going to do now?

    2006-07-07T00:00:00Z

    Architects are middle-class people who build for middle-class people. The notion of architecture as a fully independent endeavor mirrors the rise of the middle class, becoming a way in which this rising class could represent itself, make itself real.

  • Opinion

    Concrete Boots

    2006-07-07T00:00:00Z

    Comments from Concrete Boots this week

  • Opinion

    Tub Haagendas

    2006-07-07T00:00:00Z

    When we say ‘we’, of course we mean ‘I’. But we must say ‘we’ occasionally to please the tax people. Bleeagh!

  • Opinion

    Ian Martin

    2006-06-30T00:00:00Z

    I need a new ‘-opolis' to seem really smart, and apparently ‘supercalifragilisticexpilalipolis' has already been taken

  • Opinion

    Blame government, not the planners

    2006-06-30T00:00:00Z

    Few architects have a kind word to say about planners, but do they really deserve to be blamed for undermining UK competitiveness and sending big business on its way?