RIP IT UP (lecture): WHAT HAPPENED WITH THE THAMES GATEWAY DREAM?

Thursday 21 October 2010, 6:30pm, Forum - LONDON MET UNIVERSITY

A lecture by by Mark Brearley and Geoff Shearcroft, part of Rip it up and start again,a series of 12 lectures curated and chaired by Kieran Long.

Is the dream of a new city to the east of London dead? As the government scraps the development corporations charged with building the Thames Gateway, Mark Brearley, head of the mayor’s architecture and urban advisor Design for London, will talk about his unique experience of the birth, life and recent death of the concept. We will ask: what legacy has this piece of strategic thinking left? What does it reveal about the nature of long-term, strategic planmaking in UK cities? And what are the consequences for architectural practice? In response, London Met unit tutor Geoff Shearcroft of AOC Architects will present his unit’s work on the Thames Valley, and suggest how rethinking the geography of London’s surroundings will depend on a new attention to, and affection for, the life of the suburbs.