A Radical Architect, Classical

Philosopher Roger Scruton used to be Britain’s one and only conservative. Until he gave up and came to live in the United States. But he is not so Americanized that he does not know the protectors of the permanent things in England. Like architect Quinlan Terry.

Terry is a radical architect. That is, he rejects the modernist terrorism and the postmodernist irony and designs in the classic tradition. Thus the book about his work, Radical Classicism, reviewed by Roger Scruton (reg. reqd.) in the London Spectator.

For three millennia Western builders looked back to their predecessors, respecting the temple architecture of the ancients, refining its language, and adapting it to the European landscape in ways that are subtly varied, entirely memorable and above all humane. Then Le Corbusier burst on the scene. His plan was to demolish Paris north of the Seine and to put all the people into glass boxes.

When Quinlan Terry was studying architecture he had to educate himself, traveling to see great monuments, country churches, and ordinary streets in defiance of his tutors.

Needless to say, Terry’s projects, submitted as his thesis, were failed by the examiners. In satirical spirit he submitted hubristic modernist designs instead, and was allowed to pass.

What are we talking about here? We are talking about architecture as a near erotic experience, as the cover of the book tells us.

See what I mean? Why on earth did we throw all that away?

Well, Quinlan Terry didn’t, and now he’s built buildings all over the place.

Terry’s break came in 1984, when Haslemere Estates commissioned his designs for Richmond Riverside, which was to become one of London’s most popular tourist attractions. This harmonious collection of classical buildings, rising on a knoll above the Thames and enclosing offices, restaurants and private dwellings, illustrates Terry’s principles: to fit into the landscape and townscape; to use an architectural language that puts a building into relation with its neighbours and with the passer-by; to use natural materials and load-bearing walls so that the building will last and weather; to respect the realities of climate and the human need for light and air; to create forms and spaces that will lend themselves to the changing purposes of their residents and which will not die, as modernist buildings usually die, with their initial function.

Popular tourist attraction, eh?