Purcell was founded 75 years ago in response to the speed at which the past was being demolished and replaced in post-war Britain. We have never been anti-progress, but real innovation isn’t always as obvious as doing something with a new material just because it’s technically possible. We’re not claiming to have understood in 1947 everything we all now know about construction and the climate catastrophe, but the practice grew out of an instinctive understanding that if we didn’t start protecting, adapting and enhancing our heritage, it would be gone before anyone realised the consequences.