English Buildings

The ice man returneth In 1626 the great writer and polymath Francis Bacon discovered that he could preserve a fowl by packing it with ice an...

Down to earth Cob is one of the oldest and most basic of English building materials. It’s basically earth, with added straw, manure, and oft...

Word and worship This is the archetypal form of nonconformist chapel: a pair of round-headed windows on either side of a central door, a hip...

I've now added a page to my blog, accessed here or via the PAGES menu in the right-hand column, which covers the architecture of the Ge...

Festival Britain (3): Built to last Looking back, people are apt to think of the South Bank Exhibition as ‘The Festival of Britain’. But wha...

Festival of Britain (2): Festival Games I’m particularly pleased that Abram Games’s Festival of Britain symbol survives on the Oxford Street...

Festival of Britain (1): For these reliefs much thanks Of all the streets in London, or anywhere else for that matter, Oxford Street is prob...