A stretch of elevated railway track along New York's west side has been transformed into a park in the sky. Paul Owen photographs one of New York's most intriguing new attractions
The Gateshead car park is being demolished this week. It's a tragedy, and not just for its architect
Owen Luder, twice president of the Royal Institute of British Architects, is Britain's unluckiest architect. In the 60s his firm designed several once-celebrated, subsequently reviled Brutalist buildings – all now either demolished, defaced or derelict.
The latest casualty is Trinity Square in Gateshead, a combined car park and shopping centre most famous for its malevolent, melodramatic presence in Mike Hodges' Get Carter. It's one of a series of commissions that bankrupted their developer, E Alec Colman Investments – along with the (mutilated, clad in white plastic) Eros House in Catford and the (demolished, replaced by a surface car park) Tricorn Centre in Portsmouth.
Though Luder's name was on the contracts and blueprints, the lead designer was Rodney Gordon, a former social architect with the London county council seduced into shopping centres. Trinity Square promised the realisation of his dreams – a metropolis architecture of dramatic skylines, multiple levels and striking forms, on a parsimonious budget. He died last year, entirely unrepentant.
And why should he have been? These are – or rather, were – wrenchingly powerful, physical buildings, in a tradition of dark, looming, twisted architecture that stretches from Newcastle Cathedral to John Vanbrugh. Unfortunately, we have collectively decided that architecture must be either Heritage – only Baroque is allowed to be bulging and overwhelming, only Gothic can be freakish and discordant – or Regeneration, in which case all must be glassy, shiny and colourful. Luder and Gordon's generation were too modern for the former, not patronising enough for the latter.
Luder didn't descend from Hampstead to foist his gigantic concrete buildings on the benighted proletariat, but from the Old Kent Road. "Growing up as I did in rented rooms in tightly built Victorian terrace houses with no inside loo," he said, "I went along with Le Corbusier's vision of beautifully appointed multistorey houses set in big landscaped open spaces." Yet Eros House, the Tricorn and Trinity Square were cranky, strange things, doomed to commercial failure because of their architectural caprices. The Tricorn never had enough retail space to entice an "anchor", was not sufficiently freeze-dried and air-conditioned. Proles for Modernism, a mysterious south-coast group who picketed the Tricorn's redevelopers, praised it for exactly this reason.
The Tricorn's demolition inspired protests, artworks and graffiti ("WARNING – THIS BUILDING MAY PROVOKE INTEREST"). As if to neuter this, Gateshead council has sponsored both Trinity Square's demolition and its commemoration in various art events.
When he was Riba president, Luder famously hailed Richard Rogers' Lloyd's building – essentially a more expensive Tricorn in steel – as "sod you" architecture. But at the same time, he is rare in architectural circles for actually trying to explain his buildings – when Trinity Square popped up on Channel 4's Zhdanovite Demolition, Luder managed to sway some of its haters.
Trinity Square failed to be sufficiently boring. That's not the case with its mooted replacement – a Tesco store with student flats on top, clad in as many materials as possible so as not to offend, concrete-framed but avoiding the dreaded faux pas of showing the material. Rodney Gordon claimed "architecture should appeal to the emotions. It should give you that feeling from your balls to your throat". With this demolition, we're exchanging architecture as a physical experience for buildings as a mute, grinning, lobotomised accompaniment to consumerism. We should lament it, not cheer it on.
Manchester's magnificent Grade II listed London Road fire station, currently empty and decaying, looks like being granted a reprieve. Completed in 1906, the fire station once housed flats for 38 officers and their families, as well as a library, bank, stables, gymnasium, police station and court. Now, after almost a decade on the national buildings "at risk" register, owners the Britannia group have lodged a planning application to convert it into a 227-room luxury hotel, maintaining and restoring many of the building's original features. The engine sheds will become function rooms, the police station will be a bar – with booths in the cells. The original firemen's poles, which took the men straight from their living rooms into the engine sheds, are being kept, and will feature in many of the bedrooms. Most inventive of all, the coroner's court, used for an inquest as recently as 1998, will become a wedding venue. "Once the work is complete, it will be the first time in more than 20 years that the public will be able to go inside," said an exultant Alex Baldwin, conservation adviser for the Victorian Society, which has been keeping an anxious eye on the London Road site for a number of years.
Owners of centre featuring three miles of shop fronts furious as they say listed status will inhibit 'future evolution and growth'
At the heart of the concrete and brick labyrinth of Milton Keynes, hard by Midsummer Boulevard, a certified national treasure has been identified. To the disgust of its owners and the bewilderment of many customers, the town's 1970s shopping centre is now a Grade II listed building.
The letter from the heritage minister John Penrose to the owners, who have fought hard against the honour being inflicted on them, says: "The secretary of state [Jeremy Hunt] is persuaded by the advice from English Heritage and others that the MK building possesses high-quality finishes and materials throughout (which is unusual for this type of building), with a high quality of design and unusual roof-top service area access, which all contribute to the building's architectural interest."
The minister's letter concedes it has never been universally loved, but points out that in 1979 and 1980, soon after it opened, it won a string of construction and design awards.
The town was the last and largest, and by far the most resolutely modern, of the postwar new towns – though it has some surprisingly romantic features, such as the alignment of Midsummer Boulevard, and the shopping centre itself, with the sunrise on the summer solstice. But it still feels raw, despite celebrating its 40th birthday in 2007.
Although much mocked, especially for its concrete cows (given by artist Liz Leyh), the town also had admirers from the start. And many of the residents who moved from battered postwar inner cities loved their bright new houses and streets.
The shopping complex, recently rebranded thecentre:mk, is half a mile long and attracts over 30 million people a year. The architectural bible Pevsner described it in 1994 as "still the best-looking if no longer the biggest shopping centre" in the UK.
"I am absolutely thrilled, I really never thought I'd see this day," said Jon Wright of the 20th Century Society, friend and champion of many an unloved, rain-streaked, concrete hulk. "This really flags the building up as the heart of Milton Keynes, and a building of international importance. I hope now the owners will wear the listing as a badge of pride." That turned out to be wishful thinking.
In a statement, Jon Weymouth, representing the owners, Hermes Property Asset Management and PRUPIM, said: "We are disappointed with the decision taken by the DCMS to list the property. Our concerns that this decision will impact upon the future evolution and growth of thecentre:mk and Central Milton Keynes remain. Both owners will clearly need time to study the decision and its implications."
They owners have fought a rearguard action for most of a decade to ward off the listing, arguing that it would strangle commercial development of the site.
The centre's director, Robert Goodman, has described it as "nondescript and characterless".
The only consolation is that the minister rejected English Heritage advice that it deserved Grade II* listing and placed it in the lowest Grade II category – which in theory could make it easier to win listed building consent for future alterations.
Andrew Teacher, spokesman for the British Property Federation, said: "At a time where we need the freedom for people to invest in regeneration projects to create new jobs, listing the MK Centre is utter madness. One can only hope that Elephant and Castle shopping centre – another key regeneration zone – isn't next on the list. It epitomises all the worst aspects of local protectionism."
The original design, begun in 1973 and completed in 1979, had clean bright simple lines influenced by the German architect Mies van der Rohe, with lots of natural light and plants. It was first proposed for listing in 2002, but that application was withdrawn when the owners reached a management agreement with English Heritage. However the 20th Century Society applied again last year, arguing that the agreement was failing to protect original features including a fountain filled courtyard now drained to make room for more commercial space.
Wright said he could not understand why anyone would not love both the town and the centre.
"I absolutely adore Milton Keynes, I think it's absolutely unique and special – and it's only going to get better with time," he insisted.
By happy coincidence, this weekend also marks the opening of a two-week arts festival celebrating the under-rated cultural richness of Milton Keynes, including its architectural heritage.The townlaid out onagrid pattern more sympathetic to cars than pedestrians – the shopping centre website boasts "there are around 20,000 parking spaces in central Milton Keynes" – will appropriately welcome The Magical Menagerie, the world's only square carousel, created two years ago by the artist Francois Delaroziere for Senart, another new town outside Paris.
The festival will alsofeature a sinister sound sculpture by Janek Schaefer, who lived as a child on the outskirts of Milton Keynes. His piece, Asleep at the Wheel, housed in a disused former Sainsbury's superstore,
On the face of it, there shouldn't be much controversy about the listing of thecentre:mk. In both architectural and functional terms it's incredibly successful: a modern cathedral of commerce; airy, light and extremely elegant; an attempt to fulfil the dreams of the Weimar Republic in Buckinghamshire. There are many less notable listed buildings, so it should be an open and shut case.
There are two real reasons why it wasn't. First, it's a post-war building; and second, it's a shopping mall. Shopping malls, like the factories whose central place in our culture they replaced, are not supposed to have "architecture". They come in two forms: the concrete monstrosities sponsored in 60s inner cities by the Arndale company, or the out of town neoclassicism-in-fibreglass efforts of the 80s, like Sheffield's Meadowhall. They're either aggressive or kitsch; thecentre:mk is neither. Its minimalism taps into a more optimistic idea of architecture, as does its erstwhile politics.
The modern shopping mall was invented by Victor Gruen, a Viennese socialist who wanted to create urbanity in the new American suburbs of the 1950s. Milton Keynes, planned from the late 60s, aimed at a similar mix of the social and commercial. At first, the shopping building was a public right of way, open all hours, designed not just for purchasing but for real popular interaction. It soon became a private mall, but the architecture endures, a lost vision of public modernism.
To see what makes thecentre:mk special, go to the new mall next door: Midsummer Place, an inept design of "friendly" wavy roofs and tacky materials which contrasts with the original vision in almost every way.
Thecentre:mk's owners demanded the right to bastardise the architecture as they saw fit, and – especially given former architecture minister Margaret Hodge's public disdain for 20th century architecture – doubtless expected easy victory. Instead, its listing coincides with rejections of de-listing attempts from Sheffield and Coventry City Councils for their own post-war shopping buildings. Listing declares that malls can be worthwhile pieces of public architecture. The hope they might become genuinely public parts of the city is much harder to preserve.
Owen Hatherley
English Heritage survey uncovers repairs backlog of £900m, most of which is heavily dependent on shrinking grant aid
The condition of one in 10 places of worship is causing grave concern, according to a survey released today by English Heritage.
A sample of England's 14,500 listed places of worship – the largest single category of listed buildings – was surveyed in detail for the report. It found 10% in need of urgent and usually hugely complex and expensive repairs, a further 30% in poor condition, and the remainder lovingly maintained through heroic efforts by often tiny congregations.
English Heritage estimates there is a backlog of over £900m worth of urgent repairs, often due to lack of basic maintenance such as on roofs and gutters.
Major repair and conservation work is heavily dependent on grant aid, but those sources are precarious – English Heritage will inevitably have to make further budget cuts as government spending cuts bite. The main Heritage Lottery Fund-backed grants scheme is only assured until 2013, and a special provision for places of worship introduced by Labour, where the Treasury refunds the VAT – levied on repairs but not on new build, despite years of campaigning by conservation groups – runs out next year.
The situation being tackled by Andrew Mottram, at a group of churches in Dudley, represents an extreme example of all the problems spelled out in the report.
Mottram, a former vicar, is one of a growing national network of support officers, jointly funded by the church authorities and English Heritage. His job is to worry about hundreds of churches across the diocese of Worcester, advising on repairs and new uses to keep the buildings open and purposeful in the heart of their communities.
Every one of Dudley's seven large churches, four of them listed, has intractable problems. And while they have enough space for 5,000 worshippers, there is a total congregation in the town of fewer than 400 and falling.
The churches were built mainly in the 19th century for a boom town in the west Midlands with full employment in the metalworking industry. They now stand in a blighted landscape of derelict buildings, closed factories, shops and workshops, cleared sites, shuttered abandoned pubs with tattered "for sale" signs flapping in the wind. Right in the centre Beatties, the department store which was once the pride of the town, is also shuttered and desolate, its lifeblood drained by the out of town Merry Hill shopping centre. Even a nearby sex shop has a sign on the door offering "new lower prices".
There is a local authority town centre regeneration scheme, but it won't lap up the hills as far as most of Mottram's churches.
There's lovely St Thomas's, Grade II* listed, its magnificent spire held together with rusting iron clamps, with 25 people rattling around among seats for 1,000.
There's St James's, where the urgent job of replacing all the leaking gutters and downpipes has just been downgraded to second most urgent when great chunks of stone dropped off the tower, two days before hundreds of children were due to march through the door below for a school service. The vicar, Andrew Wickens, has been offered a repair grant by English Heritage, but has just learned he can't raise the match funding.
And then there's St John's. Mottram sighs. Everyone sighs at the mention of St John's.
St John's stands, just, on top of Kates Hill, with a dazzling view from its steep churchyard which holds the grave of a local hero, the 19th-century boxer nicknamed the Tipton Slasher. The church itself is closed and fenced off, windows boarded, cracked walls streaked with damp and mould, concrete surrounds cracking ominously and littered with freshly fallen chunks of stone. A heavy new concrete tile roof 30 years ago did more damage to the structure than the leaking slates it replaced.
Richard Stanton, who now lives in Bridgnorth, has come back to visit the graves of his parents. "It's awful to see it like that, I remember it full of people every week," he says sadly.
A dauntless preservation society is running a little charity shop and cafe next door, but it's going to take a lot of 20p tombola tickets and 30p glasses of squash to save St John's. The congregation has moved into the red-brick church hall across the road, beside the derelict pub: they would like to see the church restored, but they don't want to move back into the great cold draughty barn.
The diocese and the congregation are so sensitive about the state and possible future of St John's they don't even want it photographed.
Mottram is brutal: "This building is knackered. It might be rescuable – but it's going to cost a heck of a lot of money."
The first English Heritage report on England's 14,500 listed places of worship at risk found:
• Approximately 10% are potentially in need of urgent major repairs.
• At least £925m worth of overdue repairs must be done in the next five years.
• For two-thirds of congregations, funding major repairs is a constant source of worry.
• Without the £25m a year repair grants scheme, joint funded by English Heritage and the Heritage Lottery Fund, 76% of repair and maintenance projects could not have been completed in the past eight years, and up to 266 places of worship would have closed because their condition was so dangerous.
• One in five said they could not have done repairs without the Treasury scheme which refunds VAT for repairs on places of worship. This runs out next year, just as VAT is set to increase from 17.5% to 20%.
I may have had my doubts about its recent refurb, but this Oxford museum now ranks among the world's greatest, as a dazzling new archaeological exhibition proves
After its ambitious renovation, Oxford's Ashmolean Museum has begun to look like a major museum in a major city. The gallery has a world-class collection, encompassing the archaeological treasures of Lord Arundel and Arthur Evans, the cabinet of curiosities of Elias Ashmole, and one of the most fascinating Renaissance paintings anywhere, Piero di Cosimo's Forest Fire.
Still, I wasn't sure about the refit when I made my first visit to the reopened museum recently. I liked the old place. Now, there is in effect a new building inserted into its centre, with a light-filled and spectacular atrium linking galleries reimagined as a tour of world cultures, constantly stressing east-west connections and global views. I found it a bit loud, to be honest. The displays are didactic in a way that is, at times, a bit intrusive – in the Roman gallery, for example, where a massive illuminated map of the Roman empire distracts you from the old stuff in cases at the sides.
But I soon cheered up. Everything is beautifully lit, clearly captioned and inviting. Superb Greek vases held me entranced. The current exhibition, The Lost World of Old Europe, is a brilliant survey of a neolithic culture that achieved very high levels of sculpture, including rare models of prehistoric houses. The Danube valley, it turns out, is one of the true cradles of humanity. The ceramics here are of a very high quality – often voluptuously beautiful – and this simple, serious archaeological encounter demonstrates that this museum is far from selling its intellectual soul.
The Ashmolean joins other museums around the country, from Manchester to Cambridge, that have turned themselves into dazzling culture palaces that rival the rich city museums of the US. I am glad so much renewal has been achieved by museums during the good times – it will give them some ballast in the rocky years ahead.
At times a byword for street violence and social problems, Manningham in Bradford has been chosen by English Heritage for the latest book in its Informed Conservation series
A northern suburb whose name was a byword for street violence and social problems just 10 years ago has been praised today for its exuberant community life, and a landscape which stands in comparison to Bath.
Manningham in Bradford, which suffered two serious disturbances after policing problems in 1995 and an extreme rightwing rally in 2001, has been chosen by English Heritage for the latest book in its Informed Conservation series of guides.
Architects and historians combine to admire the squares and crescents of honey-coloured stone which spill down the hillside from Lister's velvet and silk mill, one of the largest monuments to Britain's textile trade. They also dissect a history of immigration and diversity stretching far back beyond the south Asian community, the latest to stamp its mark on the area.
Previous residents include prosperous and talented German Jews, among them the families of the composer Frederick Delius and the poet Humbert Wolfe. Their influence was so strong that the Lord's Prayer at Oak Lane school was recited every morning in German.
The book, Character and Diversity in a Bradford Suburb, accepts that textile decline and "white flight" led to decay from the 1960s, with half-hearted council demolition leaving parts of Manningham rundown. It also analyses how the exceptional mix of housing, with back-to-back terraces alongside the handsome squares and villas with large gardens, has always caused tensions, including the Lister's mill strike in 1890 which led to the formation of the Independent Labour party.
"I can remember the noise of hundreds of feet going over pavements to the mill. And when the hooter went for closing – you could hardly cross the road without being run over," says Betty Hurd, 80, whose memories form part of a DVD, Tales and Trails of Manningham, issued with the book.
"The mill was such a part of Manningham and it was very sad when production stopped," she adds.
Closure in 1992 led to dereliction but the mill is now being converted into flats by the Manchester developers Urban Splash. Lister Park, Manningham's biggest green space, meanwhile won £3.2m from the Heritage Lottery Fund in 1997 to restore its Victorian boating lake and build a south Asian Mughal water garden.
The guide takes visitors to these sights, but also includes lesser-known parts of the suburb, including a surviving 17th century manor house and a grid of terraces with a largely overlooked importance in the growth of British democracy. They were built with the help of the Liberal MP Sir Titus Salt, better-known for his model village Saltaire near Bradford (now a UN world heritage site), to allow workers to own property and thus qualify for a vote.
"Manningham has a reputation as a run-down area with problems and true enough it has had its share of ups and downs," says Trevor Mitchell, Yorkshire and the Humber's regional director for English Heritage, at the book's launch in Lister's Mill. "But things are on the up. Look behind the occasional neglect and what you have is one of England's greatest Victorian suburbs. Bradford is one of England's greatest stone cities and Manningham perhaps its finest district, bearing comparison - as the book says - to that better-known architectural gem, Bath."
Mitchell drew the comparison between today's diverse community and the past, highlighting Manningham's "stunning" synagogue built in 1880 to an Arabic design, and quoting the writer, JB Priestley, whose father introduced Britain's first school meals at the local Green Lane school. Priestley said of the immigrants in his English Journey, published in 1934: "They were different, and brought more to the city than bank drafts and lists of customers. They acted as a leaven, just as a colony of typical West Riding folk would act as a leaven in Munich or Moscow. These exchanges are good for everybody."
The new book has been welcomed by local people, who cite high demand for housing, very few empty properties and easy walking distance to Bradford city centre as attractions of what the book calls "an established, well-loved community". Manningham has been notably exempt from the problems which led to the last government's housing market renewal initiative, which has seen controversial demolitions in Manchester, Liverpool and a number of Lancashire towns.
"Bradford is the best city in the world and England is the best country in the world and Manningham is the best place in Bradford," said Khadam Hussain, chair of Victor Street mosque. The look of relief on the faces of city councillors, who fight a constant battle against persistent, unhappier images left by the violence of the past, was manifest.
It was partly conservation – I had moved from Bath and made the same comparison as English Heritage does in the new book – but more that Southfield Square was an ideal of urban life. We each had a garden in the middle but work and the city centre was a walk away. The cultural mix had everybody learning from everyone else.
Nancy Boychuk from the Ukraine scolded her Bangladeshi neighbours into growing flowers as well as vegetables. Iqbal and Razir Ansari invited you in for samosas while Dorothea Foster, a distant relation of the Black Dyke Mills family, advised on Yorkshire pudding.
Karin Parbus continued her family's tradition in 1930s Tallinn of using actual candles on her Christmas tree. The two Wright sisters told illuminating stories of the prejudice they suffered as Anglo-Indians before coming to Yorkshire from India.
The most interesting lesson, however, was the contrast between this reality and outsiders' perceptions, especially in the media. Our campaign was set back, for instance, when the celebrated photographer Don McCullin ran a classic northern cobbles-and-litter-in-the-rain series in the Sunday Times colour magazine.
Fortuitously, the same paper's distinguished critic Ian Nairn arrived shortly afterwards and wrote a piece on the Southfield Square campaign which anticipated today's English Heritage book in its optimism and warmth. It caught the eye of the national Civic Trust, which was looking for a northern conservation project to back. They chose us, the council changed tack and the square survives – handsomely illustrated in the new book. MW
• Irish owners refinance and want to list the project on Aim
• See our gallery of previous redevelopment plans
The troubled owners of Battersea power station have unveiled plans to float the building on the stock exchange in the latest in a string of attempts to redevelop the derelict London landmark.
Despite numerous plans for the 40-acre site, it has stood empty for more than a quarter of a century while the rest of the Thames waterfront around it has undergone huge change.
Now Irish property group Real Estate Opportunities (REO), which bought the Battersea site in 2006 for £400m, wants to spin it off and possibly float it on London's Alternative Investment Market (Aim). It is also looking for a partner to take a 50% stake in the project and provide the financial firepower.
REO has been hit hard by the Irish property slump. It reported an underlying loss before tax of nearly £1bn for the 14 months to 28 February, reflecting an £811m drop in the valuation of its property portfolio.
The firm has drawn up a shortlist of possible investors after being approached by a number of international real estate groups, private equity firms and sovereign wealth funds from around the world, including the Middle East.
REO hopes to get permission to redevelop the site in September after submitting the largest ever planning application made in central London, in terms of financial value, last autumn. If it gets the go-ahead, the site's value is expected to soar from the current valuation of £388m.
"It's an opportunity to turn the power station into a cultural icon for London," said Robert Tincknell, who runs REO's parent firm, Treasury Holdings. "A year ago, people were saying 'it's not going to happen'. That's changed enormously over the last 12 months, with the planning permission having gone in and the support we have [from the London mayor, Boris Johnson, English Heritage and Wandsworth Council]." The Conservatives launched their election manifesto at the power station in April.
Treasury Holdings was forced to tear up its plans for the imposing building, one of London's most recognisable landmarks, and start again after Johnson decided that a proposed tower would ruin the view from Waterloo Bridge to the Palace of Westminster. The original plan, drawn up by the New York-based architect Rafael Viñoly, included a futuristic 300m glass funnel and atrium, rising from an enormous transparent dome.
Viñoly and Treasury Holdings came up with a new blueprint a year ago that is capped at a height of 60m, as stipulated by the mayor. It includes 3,700 homes, office space, shops, restaurants and leisure facilities, at a cost of £4.5bn. Treasury Holdings also hopes to co-fund an extension of London Underground's Northern Line to the site.
The high cost means the company needs a partner – "someone who can bring big financial strength to it to make sure it happens," said Tincknell. Building work could start at the end of 2011.
When the power station was decommissioned in 1983, its then owners, the Central Electricity Generating Board, wanted to tear down the building and replace it with housing, but it had been given a Grade II listing in 1980. For developers, the real prize is the land around it; most have little interest in its heritage status.
REO said today it had negotiated new lending terms for Battersea with Lloyds Banking Group and Nama – Ireland's "bad bank" – which means its existing bank facility will be extended and all outstanding breaches waived.
Gallery: Images from the recently restored gardens and the superb new cafe at Chiswick House and Gardens
The airy halls and Moorish touches of Lord Leighton's house in London show a flair for interior design that surpassed his skill as an artist
Bright, sunny days are not the best on which to visit Victorian museums – unless, that is, they happen to possess a Moorish indoor courtyard with wooden lattice windows, where sunlight plays delicately on blue tiles and a cooling fountain. Lord Leighton's house near Holland Park reopened recently after a generous restoration. I had never been before, and I'm glad my first visit was during the heatwave last weekend: it really made the Islamic atrium resemble the lovely courtyards of Cordoba and Seville.
Frederic Leighton was one of the most acclaimed and financially successful artists of his age. And he knew how to spend it. The house that he built himself is an orientalist's fantasy compounded with a Renaissance prince's studiolo. It is a cultural argument set in stone, gold and Iznik ware. In the glorious domed indoor courtyard is a copy of a Roman statue from the House of the Faun in Pompeii. This makes you see that it resembles the inner world of a Roman villa as much as an Andalusian or Turkish palace. European, Asian and African influences mingle in playful beauty in the open, well-lit living spaces. There's a free flow to the place that anticipates 20th-century architecture: it makes you wish Leighton had designed more buildings, instead of churning out so many industrious history paintings.
But there's the problem. The crowning glory of this wondrous home is Leighton's studio, a great day-lit hall with a gallery from which he could survey his latest masterpiece. Its restored decor includes images of Renaissance art, placed there to inspire him, and fireplaces lovingly decorated with marble inlays. What an incredibly luxurious and well-appointed working space. As for its scale, it looks forward to the warehouses preferred by today's artists.
But an artist's fame and prestige in their own lifetime does not guarantee a place in history. Would this 19th-century art star have minded that his house is more admired today than any of his paintings or statues?
After all, French artists with no reputation and no money were painting canvases immeasurably more worthwhile than Leighton's stately constructions. Another lord, Kenneth Clark, visiting the palaces of the baroque in his venerable television classic Civilisation, opined that "no truly great thing was ever thought or imagined in a really big room". Leighton's studio is a monument to that fact.
