New London Quarterly Issue 30

MIPIM is here again, with a new focus this year on the prospects for London and its international trade on the world stage following Brexit.

We ask our Viewpoint panel this time what they think might transpire from life after Article 50, and the subject rears its head again in a think tank which discussed NLA’s plans for an investigation into the capital’s ongoing status as world design hub.

One practice making its mark internationally is Alison Brooks Architects, the only UK name on the Mies van der Rohe Award shortlist this year, and pushing forward past its 20th anniversary into cultural as well as housing projects. Brooks is our New Londoner this time, in the aftermath of a Housing White Paper that aims to ‘fix’ the sector and shifts the focus onto renting rather than homeowning. 

Martyn Evans is more concerned with the (un)common wealth of the UK than the Commonwealth, leading a charge for developments which can be good for the communities they sit within. Evans, profiled this issue, is looking to export the principles he learnt under Richard Upton at U+I and Anita Roddick at The Body Shop into a book, development projects in his own backyard around London  and the revitalisation of the Dartington Estate down in Devon.

We talk to another international figure, Santiago Calatrava, as he unveils his Peninsula Place scheme to revitalise Greenwich Peninsula for Hong Kong-based developer Knight Dragon. And worldwide big name in advertising Ogilvy gives us an insight into its stylish workplace by BDG at Sea Containers House on the South Bank in a new feature called ‘The  Way we Work’. Buckley Gray Yeoman, more concerned with a resolutely London-focused output, is our Top of their Game profile, emphasised by its new role in The Goodsyard, and London is the focus of our Big Debate special exploring the next London Plan’s key priorities.

London’s place in the global picture is clearly in a state of flux, as is that of the wider UK. But MIPIM, with London’s key representatives, organisations and cheerleaders transporting themselves down to the Riviera for a week – some pushing borough collaborations, particularly in the east, others under the wider, governmental department for international trade banner – will be a chance to test that standing on the world stage. 

David Taylor, Editor