Russell Curtis
@russellcurtis
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Founder @rckarchitects , but everything here my own. Barnet, London & Europe. Pro-housing & Yimby. @PricedOutUK advisory board and chair of Barnet QRP.
London, UK
Joined January 2009
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THIS IS LITERALLY THE DEFINITION OF A BROWNFIELD SITE
I am pleased that a plan to demolish a family home on Riddlesdown Road, Purley and replace it with a large block of flats has been refused. New homes are needed but the right place for new flats is Croydon town centre, central London and brownfield sites.
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Just reflecting on the catastrophic loss of undeveloped land in England if we went ahead and built 4.5m homes.
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Just a quick reminder that Britain's countryside is safe, even if we decided to build 4.5m homes on it. Which we're not.
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Note this fascinating thread on the scandalous “tendering” of PPE supply contracts. This investigation relies on info from the EU'S TED portal. After Brexit, even this transparency will cease. Is there any indication that the UK will have a satisfactory equivalent? No.
We are already pursuing a
Government over the £108m PPE contracts it said it entered into with a chocolatier and a supplier of pigeon netting.
I know there's only so much of this weirdness you can take but here are two more.
First Aventis Solutions Limited.
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Every public authority:
❌ “Design competitions are risky”
❌ “D&B is the only way to deliver projects cost-effectively”
❌ “Sustainable design is unaffordable”
❌ “Good design is too expensive”
@NorwichCC
:
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Can't quite believe that I've never come across this extraordinary landscape south of Amsterdam before—apparently the product of peat extraction, which was used to heat the grand houses of the city. Now inhabited by holiday homes largely accessible only by boat.
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Architects: “We are undervalued and underpaid. We deserve more respect!”
Also architects:
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✅ 144 x 100% affordable homes
✅ Next to Crossrail station
✅ "No adverse impacts" on privacy
✅ Recommended for approval by officers
❌ 2,627 objections
❌ Refused by planning committee
✅ Allowed at appeal
But sure, the planning system isn't in need of reform.
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Here's something I've been working on with
@rupesh_varsani
.
Frustrated by the inaccessibility of much of London's open space, we've been looking at who owns golf courses, how much land they take up―and whether they could be put to better use.
(1/12)
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This report is tosh. We have design, masterplanning & placemaking skills *in abundance*. What we need more of are:
1) clients who want to create decent places
2) planners who understand good design
3) contractors who care about quality
What we don’t need? A new “design school”.
Gove backs creation of design school to ‘revive traditional architecture’
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The Amsterdam School's social housing of the early 20th Century is utterly brilliant.
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It's nuts that stations like this exist so close to London. 45 mins into London Bridge and capacity for 10,000 homes within walking distance of the station. A new compact settlement here would barely harm anyone.
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Using my
#SmallSites
AI tool, I've identified around 1,700 side-street infill opportunities in Lewisham alone (that's nearly half of the borough's entire small sites target).
Here's a map showing where they all are.
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Student accommodation really is urban cancer, isn't it? Bloated tumours of cheap, garish cladding bursting from the heart of undeserving cities.
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How is it that the refurbishment of a tower block in London can cost £70m, yet in France, Lacaton & Vassal can do these brilliant adaptations and extensions for around a tenth of the price?
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Local communities' complaints about central government housing targets don't seem so unreasonable when you see stuff like this being submitted to planning.
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please god don't let daniel liebskind anywhere near the spire competition
Architect Daniel Libeskind was in Paris sketching Notre Dame hours before the fire. "Deep below the site lies memory. It was the scream of the stone that had been neglected for decades" he told the audience at
#RIBAVitrA
talk. (1880s photo from
@RIBAPix
)
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Possibly unpopular take: architecture is a social endeavour, and increased working from home will come at the cost of diminished learning and personal development. Younger architects in particular can expect slower career progression the more time they spend away from the studio.
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OK, having pretty much reached the conclusion of my suburban density study, here's a lengthy and rather geeky explanation of how London's suburbs can accommodate 900,000 new homes through incremental intensification.
Towards a Suburban Renaissance!
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Anyone know anything about this extraordinary house (seemingly named "The Long House, for obvious reasons) in Lewisham?
An unassuming pair of garage doors lead...to...this!
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99% of public procurement captured in a single image.
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Brookman's Park Station: capacity for 5,700 homes immediately adjacent to a station which is just 40 minutes from Moorgate.
If you want to "rocket boost" the economy, release this from green belt and build more homes.
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This is extraordinary: on the same day the government announces an expansion of permitted development regulations...it also publishes a report concluding homes delivered under PDR are not very good.
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You have to ask yourself if the public procurement system is functioning correctly when you commission someone to design a school for autistic children and you end up with this.
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Will someone please hurry up and ban these things?
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Difficult to see how this is anything but a massive improvement.
To everyone who cares about the conservation areas of Redchurch, Shoreditch, Boundary Estate and Brick Lane please question
@TowerHamletsNow
Planning committee and
@MayorJohnBiggs
on why this Red Monster is being considered?
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Local authority planning portals are weaponised against supporters of new housing. Look at this: listed under "reason for comment" is a full-on
#NIMBY
checklist. Where is the option for "delivers much needed homes"?
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Emboldened by
@MayorofLondon
’s new
#LondonPlan
, delighted to see our first Architects’ Retention Clause appear in a planning condition, ensuring design quality embedded in delivery.
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So you mean that the best building in the world wasn't procured through a two-stage OJEU which required five recent examples of similar work, three years of accounts and a 50 page health & safety policy? You surprise me,
@ollywainwright
"We chose the architects precisely because they are not the kind who think they know everything." A mud-brick and timber dormitory designed by a couple of 30-year-olds in a remote corner of Brazil named best building in the world
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Selecting an architect on the basis of fee is like choosing your dentist based on who has the cheapest drill.
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Four lessons to learn:
1. Don't put contractors in charge of designing buildings
2. Don't put contractors in charge of designing buildings
3. Don't put contractors in charge of designing buildings
4. Don't put contractors in charge of designing buildings
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Always a joy to write 1,000s of words in response to an architectural tender that lacks even one question asking how good you are at making buildings. (No wonder the quality of our built environment is so poor: I can't design for shit but I'm cheap & my anti-bribery policy is 👌)
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The area of London's 94 golf courses is extraordinary. Added together they take up more space than the whole of Brent, with a population of 330,800. A third of this is highly accessible, with 1,432 hectares lying within 800m of a station, town centre or with a PTAL of 3+.
(2/12)
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I've been developing a tool to try and measure the potential for intensification around London's suburban stations. Here are extracts from an online map I've created showing the entire city, with areas for densification identified. 🧵
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Some prime-time coverage of my golf course work on the front page of today's
@guardian
. In print tomorrow, it seems.
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@joehicksy
Apart from the fact that it's low-density, unsustainable, car-dependent sprawl, completely lacking in character or a sense of place?
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Aww, man - could have been an opportunity for handful of small practices to design a suite of beautiful little follies peppering the landscape...but this is just sooo dull. 🥱
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It’s extraordinary how many of these godawful layouts appear on social media, usually accompanied by some anodyne statement celebrating a recent planning consent. Everyone involved should be hanging their heads in shame, not posting site plans on LinkedIn.
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Richard Rogers continued tradition of architects' softball in Regent's Park well into his 80s. In 2015 RS+P played RCKa, and Richard came along, batting and fielding with the rest of us. Afterwards he took us all to the Edinburgh Castle and paid for the drinks. What a star. RIP.
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My 6.30pm 4.5 hour train from London to Edinburgh (cost £200 single) still hasn't left Kings Cross, and I've managed to get to Stansted and onto a flight costing £50 less which arrives earlier.
If we want to decarbonise, we have to do better than this.
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Ladies and gentlemen, for your delectation and delight, I give you some of the finest external spaces designed by humankind 👇🏻.
Enjoy the view!
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@ikeijeh
I think the families of the 72 that died are probably more concerned about the years of Tory deregulation that led to their loved ones dying so horrifically - deregulation which JRM seems to be intent on doubling down on rather than proposing any positive alternatives.
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The Danish Architecture Centre: full of life, kids running about, fun, and citizens engaging with buildings. All things the RIBA could be if it wasn’t in such a dumb location, in a stifling building and more interested in talking than teaching.
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Rather than farting around on twitter or instgramming your cat, why not use a daily walk to identify potential
#smallsites
for housing in your area? Send me an OS grid reference and email address and I'll return to you a printable A4 sheet showing every small site near you.
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The idea that regional cities don't have the space to accommodate new homes is nonsense. Every pair of semi-detached houses can be replaced with 8 flats.
Land isn't lacking—just imagination.
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There's an essay to be written about the inexplicable, tasteless pseudo-mansions that are sprouting up along the Cockfosters Road.
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London's green belt doesn't belong to London.
Could we take back control and turn the entire green belt area in to a Greater London Region, with a new coordinated planning strategy that benefits everyone?
#ShouldLondonBeBigger
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I'm fascinated to know how this weird bit of development came about in Ladywell. Their postie must be knackered.
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Nothing says "eco village" like a shit ton of concrete and an infinity pool
@MYAAArchitects
is building an entire eco village for
@progressllavaneres
in the hills about Barcelona
@treehugger
@barcelona
@AjLlavaneres
@SustAbility
@archdaily
@riba
@architectsjrnal
@COACatalunya
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One for
@PlanningShit
? Nothing says "welcome home" like looking out of your bedroom window through a 2.4m black metal fence. (approved last night in north London).
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Hearing (and witnessing) some absolute horror stories about low fee bids—well below half what it takes to properly service a project. Public clients must stop indulging the backstreet dentists of the building industry and start scoring fees in a more intelligent way.
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Hey,
@michaelgove
- I’ve got a few thoughts about how you can ramp up delivery of new homes in London. See below.
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An unforeseen consequence of home working is the lack of vital spacing between meetings. Travelling from one to another provides time to reflect and prepare. Missing this out is knackering.
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Having just come back from the US, it's striking how much of its housing is built from timber. Yet here in London, grant-funded affordable housing is impossible if it includes any timber in the external walls. This policy desperately needs an update.
Housing costs less when we build more of it. That’s why President Biden is calling on Congress to pass legislation to build and renovate more than two million homes.
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🚅 Standard class return trip to Edinburgh by train next week: £214.
🛫 Standard class return trip to Edinburgh by plane next week: £60
But, sure, cut domestic air duty.
#Budget2021
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Zone 5 developer checklist:
✅ sterile white render obliterating anything that looks like “character”
✅ chunky anthracite windows
✅ all greenery replaced with concrete pavers
✅ 6500K LED security lights that trigger every 30 seconds
The suburban equivalent of coral bleaching
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@euanmills
If the kids in these homes become friends over the back fence they'll need to travel about half a mile to play together.
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@JasonSinclair7
What's shocking is that years of Tory deregulation led directly to the Grenfell tragedy, so I'd suggest you get angry at that instead.
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Getting in to some intriguing work using AI to identify potential
#SmallSites
development opportunities. A byproduct of this is automated urban morphology studies, with (almost) every property type categorised.
Example: 56,000 sites categorised in Lewisham👇🏻
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There are no longer any excuses for practices relying on excessive hours and low pay.
In the same way that ARB reports infractions of the Architects Act the
@RIBA
should name and shame Chartered Practices who fail to meet the standards required of them.
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Planning update from Hackney planning department. After trying to get permission for four flats on an empty site on behalf of a small housing association FOR THREE YEARS the planning officer has now left, and now we're back to square one.
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Dear BBC, I made a few clarifications to your article here: ?amp=1
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Thanks to
@ArchitectsJrnal
and
@Furmadamadam
for shining a light on this appalling practice. Architects who rely on unpaid interns deserve to go bust - not win high-profile public commissions.
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I don't understand why we've allowed this to happen.
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This lovely scheme was recommended for approval by officers, rejected at committee, then granted permission by public inquiry.
What a complete waste of time and money.
But sure, the planning system isn't broken. 🫤
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Being called cynical by the Spectator...that's one to cross off the bucket list!
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Public procurement officers: when commissioning architects the question you should be asking is not “have you designed one before?” but “can you design one better?”
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I just don't understand how building chuffing great pavilions in a desert can be considered "sustainable" even if one of them "captures energy from sunlight" or whatever. These are
#architectsdeclare
practices - what's going on?
A preview of the pavilions at EXPO 2020 Dubai 🌴 including Fosters' 'fidget spinner'
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Office to residential conversion in New Barnet. Surprisingly good materials and detailing. Big improvement on existing building.
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Like the bleaching of a coral reef, a joyful corner of London gets calcified into bland corporate vapidity.
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36 mile cycle ride around Lewisham today, visiting every ward in the borough.
@rckarchitects
and
@ashsakula
have been appointed by Lewisham Council to develop an SPD and design guide for small housing sites to be adopted in 2021.
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Major irony deficit as campaigners attempt to save privately-owned golf club with a £4,500 membership fee from, er, "elitist" tennis club expansion.
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Your era is over, please fuck off.
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Lovely housing scheme in central Copenhagen by Kay Fisker with CF Møller and Svenn Eske Kristensen, completed 1958. Pity the courtyard is basically a massive car park though.
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About time.
New housing allowed via permitted development must meet space standards, MHCLG announces:
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To put it another way, if Regent's Park were converted to a golf course, only 105 people could use it at the same time. In August 2007, the park was actually enjoyed by 26,000 each day.
(7/12)
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As a local resident, I'm delighted that Enfield's planning committee made the right—and brave—decision last night to approve the development of
#Cockfosters
station car park, allowing the construction of 350 desperately-needed homes to proceed.
#ProudToBeAYimby
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Bravo to
@MVRDV
for acknowledging its mistakes, but lots to learn for everyone about the correlation between level of design fee and quality of outcome. The former is usually indicative of the latter.
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"Grenfell inquiry has exposed design and build as our dirty little secret" - my contribution to the
@ArchitectsJrnal
coverage of the
#Grenfell
public inquiry.
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Public participation in the planning system would be helped immeasurably if LPA planning portals were forced to show thumbnails and a useful description of each file they hold. Randomly downloading PDFs in the hope of finding a plan does not encourage positive engagement.
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There so much potential for suburban intensification in London. Just imagine if we created a planning environment where backland development could happen easily along miles and miles of alleyways, replacing garages with homes...
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@RupaHuq
@EveningStandard
You've got over 300 hectares of greenbelt in Ealing...you could release some of that for high-density mid-rise development?
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If we learn nothing else from the collapse of
#Carillion
, it's that the future is distributed procurement: many suppliers, many contracts. Huge frameworks featuring a small number of tier 1 firms are no longer an acceptable and risk-free way to commission services.
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