Concrete and carbuncles

‘London smells Tory,’ announced Ian Martin, the Beachcomber of architectural journalism post-Boris in his weekly column in the Architects’ Journal. Heritage wars have broken out over the future of a concrete housing scheme, Robin Hood Gardens in East London by Alison and Peter Smithson, that is beloved of architects, but not, it seems, of many others. The Guardian devoted a page to complaints from classical architects that they were excluded en bloc from the Riba awards that lead to the Stirling Prize, and The Spectator is shortly to conduct a debate on whether Prince Charles’s opinion, delivered nearly 25 years ago, concerning glass stumps and monstrous carbuncles, remains as valid today.

Does architectural style have a simple relationship to political position? The early years of New Labour, when Richard Rogers was in the ascendant, may have given the impression that people would be made to like what they were told was good for them.