Engineers must stand up to architects with knighthoods, says Shuttleworth
Ken Shuttleworth urges engineers to ‘find a new Brunel’
The elevation of the architect over the engineer is to blame for today’s cities being full of unsustainable buildings, Ken Shuttleworth told engineers and students at Imperial College.
Architects are able to get away with their “orgy with glass” because engineers have lost their voice, he said, delivering the Worshipful Company of Paviors’ annual lecture on Tuesday.
The founder of Make urged engineers to “find a new Brunel” who could represent them on television and push an environmental agenda.
“In the 19th century the engineer was king,” he told the audience. “Then architects took over and design became paramount which led to this orgy with glass.
“If the engineer says ‘you can’t have this much glass’ he is sacked and replaced. Engineers need to become more assertive and tell architects what to do.
“Find the best engineer at speaking and put them on TV. Plenty of architects have knighthoods and get on TV. You need a new Brunel to promote engineering,” added Shuttelworth, who spent 30 years at Foster & Partners.
Questioned about the sustainability of Make’s plan to demolish part of the 1980s Broadgate Centre, he said conversion simply wasn’t possible.
Its £340 million replacement was London’s first sustainable office project which tried to reflect the “death of bling”, he added.
“Buildings aren’t built to be monuments. They are commodities that are built to be demolished,” he said.
“London has so many historic buildings and if you can’t knock anything down the city will stagnate. Sense has to prevail. Keep what you can keep and what works and if not, do something better.”
Related Articles
- Zaha Hadid praises consultants as she backs £1m engineering prize
22 October 2012
- Stand up to the knights, Titanic woes and L'Elephant de la Bastille
20 April 2012
- Will the Shard be listed in 30 years’ time?
12 April 2012
- Shuttleworth says Shard won't survive
21 March 2012
- Make's Broadgate building to start on site in spring
30 January 2012
- Culture secretary Jeremy Hunt denies Broadgate influence
12 August 2011
Have your say
Sign in to make a comment on this story.
Sign InDesktop Site | Mobile Site
Readers' comments (35)
Hmm. He says "“Buildings aren’t built to be monuments. They are commodities that are built to be demolished". I hope Make's will all be demolished ASAP.
Could I also suggest that architects employ systems analysts? In Bath alone, Parry's Holburne extension, the Wilkinson Eyre bus station, and in particular Grimshaw's Thermae Bath Spa building are inefficient in the extreme. Le Corbusier must be whizzing in his grave at such buildings being labelled modernist. Function and the way buildings function seem all too often to be forgotten.
But engineers earn quite a bit more than architects on average.
In one breath Shuttleworth says that his £340m Broadgate scheme is London's first sustainable office, and with the next he says that has been designed to be demolished?
Our collective carbon footprint would lie pretty deep into the sand if everyone were to take this attitude. The truth is, demolition of fine buildings, and re-development is is never sustainable - no matter how many american traders it might please.
I just wonder what planet Shuttleworth is living on.
"Its £340 million replacement was London’s first sustainable office project which tried to reflect the “death of bling”, he added."
... I think a few other companies may be surprised that Make has been credited with the first sustainable office project.
Thank God Ken is here to teach us all to be sustainable with willful shapeism.
Hertzberger, laments the fading role of the architect.
Shuttleworth is concerned of the elevation of the architect over the engineer.
wtf.
i don't care what anyone says, i think broadgate is rubbish when the ice rink isn't there
Says the man who was supposedly responsible for the concept of the Gherkin.
Astounded by these comments from the shuttle.
It's sad that we're still arguing about the merits of architects v engineers as if they are separate activities, when we should by now have reached a wonderful and sustainable concensus. In Brunel's day there was little to distinguish them. But maybe Ken chose the wrong exemplar in Brunel - he upset many a naval architect or mechanical engineer by claiming he could do their job better. He rarely did, and in reality relied on them to pull him through his more challenging schemes. And did not his glorious Paddington Station used a fair expanse of glass?