127 episodes
About Buildings + Cities Luke Jones & George Gingell Discuss Architecture, History and Culture
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5.0 • 4 Ratings
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A podcast about architecture, buildings and cities, from the distant past to the present day. Plus detours into technology, film, fiction, comics, drawings, and the dimly imagined future.
With Luke Jones and George Gingell.
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115 — John Soane 5 — London Improved
In the fifth part of our series on John Soane, we discussed his designs for speculative housing developments in central London, another building in the middle of the city for the Bank of England's National Debt Redemption Office, and his various hypothetical schemes for transforming the city with a thick encrustation of Corinthian columns. We also discussed his work for the Royal Hospital Chelsea, some of which survives to this day. We talked about John Gwynne's 'London & Westminster Improved (1766) and the ongoing problem of London and Westminster's disorderly urbanism, which Soane's unbuilt schemes cannot convincingly overcome — as always, he is at his best when constrained!
To see the images as we discuss them, check out this episode on Youtube: https://youtu.be/_Rr-GRqsc4Y
Edited by Matthew Lloyd Roberts.
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We’re on the web at aboutbuildingsandcities.org -
114 — John Soane 4 — Westminster
In this fourth episode of our miniseries on John Soane, we discussed his projects conducted over many years in and around Westminster. This is a tale of confusing canceled schemes, designs by committee, thwarted architectural vision and some of the most electrifying lost interiors of 19th-century London.
As always, you get get a better sense of the images we discuss by having a look at this episode of the show on our YouTube channel: https://youtu.be/xxeGY4LsHdM
Edited by Matthew Lloyd Roberts.
Support the show on Patreon to receive bonus content for every show.
Please rate and review the show on your podcast store to help other people find us!
Follow us on twitter // instagram // facebook
We’re on the web at aboutbuildingsandcities.org -
113 — John Soane 3 — The Bank of England
In the third episode of our ongoing series on John Soane, we discussed his magnum opus, and one of the most entrancing lost buildings ever: The Bank of England. This vast administrative complex signalled the transformation of London into the capital of a modern imperial state, but by the 1930s, after just a century of its existence, the bank had outgrown Soane's intricate and weighty toplit classicism and the whole thing was demolished. We attempt here to imagine and reconstruct what it was actually like, why it was like that, and how Soane achieved it.
See the images we discussed on our YouTube channel: https://youtu.be/FmY1bFPv-oo
Edited by Matthew Lloyd Roberts.
Support the show on Patreon to receive bonus content for every show.
Please rate and review the show on your podcast store to help other people find us!
Follow us on twitter // instagram // facebook
We’re on the web at aboutbuildingsandcities.org -
112 — John Soane 2 — Rustic / Classical
In episode 2 of our series on John Soane, we discussed the projects he worked on after returning from his Grand Tour of Italy, but before he got his career-defining job as surveyor to the Bank of England. These include several built and unbuilt schemes for country houses, a proposal for a pair of enormous prisons in strict geometrical manner, and several rural outbuildings in a rustic classicism that draw upon the founding myths of architecture.
Images for this episode can be found on our YouTube channel: https://youtu.be/0dAc_Dh1BTk
Edited by Matthew Lloyd Roberts.
Support the show on Patreon to receive bonus content for every show.
Please rate and review the show on your podcast store to help other people find us!
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We’re on the web at aboutbuildingsandcities.org -
111 — John Soane 1 — 'Visions of Early Fancy'
We're back!! In this first episode of our new series on John Soane (1753–1837) we discuss his origins: the child prodigy draughtsman, son of a bricklayer, apprentice of George Dance, winner of a studentship at the Royal Academy, and later with his Design for a Triumphal Bridge, winner of the Royal Academy and a travelling scholarship to Italy, enabling him to join the aristocratic young men of Britain on their Grand Tour. Over the rest of this series we will discuss is iconic works: the Bank of England and his house (Sir John Soane's Museum) alongside some of the deeper cuts.
Watch this episode on YouTube for accompanying images: https://youtu.be/qtB_nERFaBA?si=1q5EdJEkQbsLBRxH
Edited by Matthew Lloyd Roberts.
Support the show on Patreon to receive bonus content for every show.
Please rate and review the show on your podcast store to help other people find us!
Follow us on twitter // instagram // facebook
We’re on the web at aboutbuildingsandcities.org -
110 — Rem Koolhaas's Delirious New York — 3/3
The final part of our series on 'Delirious New York'! We discussed the culture clash between European high modernism and Manhattanism. We also discussed the Appendix at the end of the book, a set of speculative, wry, ironic and beautiful visions of where next for the retroactive manifesto, featuring the work of Madelon Vriesendorp, Zoe Zenghelis, Elia Zenghelis and Richard Perlmutter.
Hope you enjoy it!
Watch this episode with images: https://youtu.be/ouVLzj-292s
Edited by Matthew Lloyd Roberts.
Support the show on Patreon to receive bonus content for every show.
Please rate and review the show on your podcast store to help other people find us!
Follow us on twitter // instagram // facebook
We’re on the web at aboutbuildingsandcities.org