Arts Council cuts hit architecture centres
“These cuts are made worse by the fact that around 80% have to come in the first two years” - Liz Forgan
Source: Steve DoubleCuts in budget next year, with no funding guaranteed in the future
Architecture centres and design-related organisations will be forced to look for alternative sources of funding after receiving a double whammy of cuts.
Arts Council England (ACE) this week became the latest grants body to reveal the knock-on effect of the comprehensive spending review.
Despite losing nearly a third of its own budget, it announced cuts of only 6.9% would be passed on to the bodies it funds next year.
But the following year – 2012/13 – all past agreements with its regularly funded organisations (RFOs) will be torn up. Affected organisations include the Architecture Centre Network, the Architecture Foundation, Open City and architecture centres all over the country.
They will then have to bid alongside all comers for the reduced pot of money.
Many had already been hit by big cuts after the demise of Cabe and the regional development agencies.
ACE chair Liz Forgan admitted: “These are severe cuts, made worse by the fact that around 80% of them have to come in the first two years of the settlement.”
“These cuts are made worse by the fact that around 80% have to come in the first two years”
Liz Forgan
Despite uncertainty in the long term, many architecture organisations voiced relief that the initial cut was much smaller than they feared, giving them a year to make contingency plans.
This year Made, the West Midlands architecture centre, received £200,000 from its RDA, £50,000 from Cabe and £35,000 from ACE.
Its ACE grant will be cut by £2,400 next year, which chief executive David Tittle called “quite positive” in the context. The centre held a crisis board meeting last week where it discussed a direct appeal to architecture minister John Penrose.
“I think everyone left feeling fairly optimistic,” he said. “We are talking to local authorities in our region to see if they would subscribe to our services in future and the response has been better than we feared.
“Of course it’s nice to get big chunks of funding but the cuts are forcing us to get closer to our customers, which is not a bad thing.”
He said freeing organisations from the “straitjacket” of RFO status would in theory allow them to bid for bigger sums from ACE after 2012, although he acknowledged this was riskier.
The Architecture Centre Network has also been hit by falling funds from ACE but will be more worried by the loss of Cabe’s support for architecture and built environment centres, worth £900,000 in grants for the current financial year.
The network told BD it was applying for a series of European Union grants but admitted some of the 22 regional bodies it helps fund will close.
ACE grants 2011/12
- Architecture Foundation £106,168
- Architecture Centre Network £116,530
- BEAM £95,766
- Building Exploratory £65,117
- English Heritage North East £62,502
- ICA £1,326,209
- London Design Festival £74,108
- Made £32,575
- Northern Architecture £41,363
- Open City £113,028
- Serpentine Gallery £883,734
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Readers' comments (6)
I've just read the blurb on the Architecture Centre Network's website. From all the "facilitate knowledge sharing" text there, I am left still having absolutely no idea what they do or the value they deliver. Does anyone?
Having never even come across them before, I am happy to be better informed on this topic and hear in clear terms what they do with evidence for what they have actually delivered and the concrete impact they have had on architecture and the built environment in Britain.
I know of the other architecture organisations - tell me, precisely what have they achieved and delivered too?
yeah, where exactly are these 'architecture centres' anyway? With a budget that small, surely all they did was reproduce the information available on the RIBA/CABE/ARB/Planning Portal/Building Futures websites. google is free
I've never seen an architecture centre. But maybe I spend too much time down the pub. Time for a pint or two now. Anyone joining me?
As the architecture centre quoted above (MADE) first of all I have to say that we did not have a crisis board meeting (it was a regular one) and we did not consider making a direct appeal to the architecture minister.
For those of you who have never encountered an architecture centre: No, we don't just reproduce national guidance, we get stuck in at a local level, providing design review (for schemes not big enough to go to CABE), design advice to local authorities, public engagement, lectures, training for design professionals, councillors and community activists, support built enviornment education in our areas, encourage young people into the industry, advocate for the artist engagement with the built environment, competitions, awards, you name it. We do this as lean organisations, independent charities relying on the goodwill of voluntary boards and partner organisations.
Want to know more? Visit http://www.made.org.uk/ or go to the ACN site to find your nearest architecture centre.
David Tittle - I've looked at the site. You get your funding from grants, subscriptions, donations and commissions and your major funders are "currently Advantage West Midlands, CABE and the Arts Council."
When I click on the "case studies" tab, one is taken to a series of schemes, which then lead to several other non-MADE sites which discuss the scheme. I haven't seen a single scheme which clearly tells me what the architecture centre did and what results were achieved by your involvement. All the "design review" cases I could be bothered to click on after all this seem to lead to CABE's site and are CABE involved design reviews, not MADE.
What do you actually do? What have you actually achieved? What are we paying for?
If what you offer - which primarily seems to be your presence on design reviews and training, or so MADE claims - is of value, why can't you earn your existence through 100% paid commissions? If you have something of value, it'll sell.
F.A.O. David Tittle -
Unless I misunderstand your website, you try to bridge the gap between laypeople and the profession of architecture, showing them why good design brings intangible benefits for relatively little cost if matters are addressed at an early stage - the DESIGN stage - of a project. Am I correct?
If so, I say, well done. I offer free advice to people on a couple of BBSes in Ireland and the lack of awareness in the general polulation of what an architect brings to a one-off house design is causing concern.
People may choose an engineers to "draw up plans" because he is cheaper, despite the fact that is only competent to certify in relation to structure or services or civil works and sustainable building, human activity and weathering detailing is not his field.
With many home builders, you have to struggle to make them realise the benefits of retaining an architect as opposed to putting in that AGA Cooker, when mostly all they are interested in is getting someone to "sign off" on the builders work without really looking at the design content.
If you're think its hard over in Britain you should try coming over hear and fighting the good fight for a while. Certainly there are bridges that need to be built between "experts" in design and those who are most likely to benefit from their skill.
If that is what you are trying to do in Britain to bring British architecture and design up to a certain level in the public awareness, well done that man. We need you over here too, where a resurgent RIAI is only starting to tackle this problem of increasing awareness of the value of design.