Brutalism – it’s not a pretty word, is it?
A thesaurus tells us that synonymous words are barbarism, cruelty, viciousness, atrocity and violence.
So on the face of it, it’s a mystery why anyone would give the name to a school of architectural design. Architecture is after all an art which has the responsibility of creating environments which help to shape a civilised society.
Applied to architecture, the use of the term Brutalism dates from the 1950s, although there is some dispute about its origins.
It came to be used to describe a kind of modern architecture which was raw and unsentimental, its chief characteristic being that it was made of what it appeared to be made of (not necessarily concrete, although many Brutalist buildings are). Nothing was to be covered up or concealed, whether a steel column or an electricity conduit.
This quality is sometimes described (rather misleadingly) as “honesty”, and it is an admirable quality for architecture to have. It’s just a pity that such an unlikeable word as Brutalism was chosen to categorise it, because the word undoubtedly prejudices many people against innocent buildings.
This is certainly true in the case of the architect John Madin’s 1974 Central Library in Birmingham, perhaps the most celebrated building in the city to be categorised as Brutalist.
Although a very fine example of architecture, one of the best buildings of its period, it is widely and irrationally hated both in the city council and beyond, and I am sure that the tag of Brutalism hung around its neck is at least partly to blame.
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The name ‘Brutalism’ may be only 60 years old, but its characteristics are ancient. Compare the Central Library, for instance, with a building that thousands of Brummies visit on holiday, and admire – Harlech Castle. This is certainly medieval brutalism. Overwhelmingly solid and unforgiving, it makes no concessions to either context or politeness.
A library is unlikely to display viciousness, but Harlech Castle certainly does, built as it was to violently suppress an occupied people. Yet we love it unreservedly.
It seems to be unavoidable that all historical periods of architecture go through a shadowy timezone in which their virtues are unappreciated.
The High Victorians hated Georgian domestic architecture, believing it to be boring and repetitive, and demolished swathes of it when they had the opportunity. In the 20th century, Victorian architecture was similarly despised until the 1980s, when it emerged from the shadows (at least, that of it which had survived destruction in the 60s and 70s).
Similarly, the architecture of the 1960s and 70s is now in the shade. Admittedly, an awful lot of bad and wrongheaded buildings were built in this period. However, there are exceptions, and discrimination is needed to identify and appreciate them, and not damn them all uncritically.
But there are signs that mid-20th century architecture is emerging from the shadows.
On in London until November 24 is an English Heritage exhibition called “Brutal and Beautiful: Saving the Twentieth Century”. It documents the best of the postwar buildings which have been added to the statutory list of protected historic architecture.
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Many of these buildings are extremely popular: for example, Denys Lasdun’s National Theatre, completed in 1976 and listed Grade II*, another concrete building with which Madin’s library can be compared. A smaller, local example is New Street Station’s 1964 signal box in Navigation Street, listed Grade II.
English Heritage twice recommended the Central Library for statutory listing at Grade II, in 2003 and 2007, and government ministers twice turned it down. Political pressure from Birmingham or anti-brutalism prejudice in Whitehall? Probably some of both.
The present Minister for Culture, Ed Vaizey, appears to have a more enlightened attitude to Brutalist architecture. In September he listed another controversial concrete building, the 1969 Preston Bus Station, designed by Building Design Partnership. A survey by the Lancashire Evening Post in 2010 found it to be Preston citizens’ favourite building.
In September Vaizey also listed the massively concrete 1968 Moore Street electricity substation in Sheffield. The Leader of Sheffield City Council regards the building as iconic: the council has illuminated it in primary colours, and the Leader describes it as “a shining beacon for the city”.
Next May, Oxford University is holding a two-day conference on the subject “Modernism versus Brutalism in Twentieth Century British Architecture”. Madin’s Central Library, very widely discussed and appreciated outside Birmingham, is very likely to feature.
So popular and official thinking on mid-20th century architecture is changing and progressing, just as it did decades ago on 19th century architecture.
Why is Birmingham lagging behind the national trend? Indeed it is opposing the trend, by stubbornly sticking to its decision to demolish the Central Library in 2014.
A more enlightened and forward-thinking city council would cherish Birmingham’s best mid-century building by its best architect, and find new economic uses for it now the books have left.
In 2014 the Friends of the Central Library (I am a member) are planning to remove some misconceptions, by holding their own conference on Brutalism in the West Midlands.
Perhaps we are stuck with the name (I’ve used it 13 times here already), but equally, perhaps it can be shown that the reality transcends the name’s misleading connotations.
• Joe Holyoak is a city-based architect and urban planner