Would you save this building?

Yahoo

16-02-2025

Youth may be wasted on the young. But it seems half a century-old brutalist architecture most certainly is not.
The concrete tower housing Wolverhampton's School of Art was erected three decades before the current cohort of students were born, but they are taking to the streets, and studios, to battle against its proposed demolition. In a city centre gallery space, young artists are fashioning a giant robot out of cardboard – the George Wallis building taking on a life of its own. The same could be said of the campaign.
In the fortnight since plans emerged to level the nine-storey school, students have already marched in protest, a petition has amassed 6,000 signatures and acclaimed graduates including Claudette Johnson and Keith Piper have spoken out. It comes as The Brutalist – a film up for 10 Oscars and nine Baftas – has introduced a new generation to the love-it-or-hate-it mid-century architectural style.
'A symbol of working-class arts education in the region would be lost,' says the alumnus leading the fight, a 34-year-old artist who goes by the name Bag Lord. 'My love for the building started when I was a kid coming back from the supermarket, driving round the ring road and being, like, whoa, that's epic – it looks like something out of Star Wars, like it could take off.'
The block, opened in 1970, was designed by Diamond, Redfern & Partners. The Twentieth Century Society, which has applied for it to receive listed status, wants to see 'its sculptural concrete exoskeleton' upgraded or reconfigured. A spokesman for Historic England says it is assessing the bid. 'In due course we will submit our advice to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, who will then make the final decision.'
Staff tell me they have been told not to speak to the press, while students complain that protest posters put up in the windows have been taken down within the hour. The University of Wolverhampton says its estate is simply too big, 'over-provisioned by 30 per cent, equating to an annual operating cost of £6 million'. Its 'Estates Masterplan' aims to 'improve the student experience, protect jobs, enhance staff welfare and deliver growth', resulting in a new medical school and the relocation of the arts faculty to a 'location TBC'.
This alarms Michael Cumming, an award-winning film director who graduated from Wolverhampton in 1985 and says the university is failing 'to recognise that unique, individual buildings can inspire and cultivate unique, individual people. This is a building with spirit, character, integrity and history that stuck two fingers up to the architecture around it.'
It is a rare example of a post-war art school that has remained in its original use. Bag Lord says this is evident from every detail of the design: 'The doors and the staircase and lifts – you can get massive paintings and sculptures through them. It's all purpose-built. The light in there is amazing.'
Sally Cook, 68, a local retiree, is less interested in the art than the architecture and says the plans to send in the bulldozers are 'an abomination'.
'There are not many places that make Wolverhampton stand out as significant. They'd never think of knocking the Southbank Centre [in London] down. But Wolves, they think they can do anything they like, because people think it's a s---hole and it's not. They'll put something very bland with plastic cladding up in its place.'
On the streets of the city, most residents have a gentle affection for the structure. 'It's a bit ugly,' concedes Julie Joyce, a 60-year-old carer, 'but, yeah, of course it should be saved. It's just been there forever – all my childhood. It's our Wolverhampton.' Janet Fletcher, 66, says: 'That's crackers, isn't it? I like it.'
But Sarah Groom, 57, a canteen assistant from the nearby village of Codsall, is not a fan. 'No, I think they could put something better there. It's not beautiful and it's not classic – it's not exactly St Paul's Cathedral, is it?'
Those left totally cold by brutalism's hefty shapes and rough surfaces may be surprised by the depth of love for George Wallis, which hosted Turner Prize winner Lubaina Himid and Venice Biennale Golden Lion recipient Dame Sonia Boyce when the First National Black Art Convention was held there in 1982.
Artist Niki Gandy has lectured and is currently completing her PhD on the site. The threat to the building – and the teaching within it – means so much to her that she got the tower tattooed on her arm in 2021, as courses started to be cut and staff (including her supervisor) were made redundant. 'It was plain to me that it wouldn't be long before our institution would be taken from us,' she says. 'Hence, I decided to wear my colours on my sleeve.'
Brutalism buff Christopher Beanland is working on an Edinburgh comedy show about the movement and has written both non-fiction (Concrete Concept) and a West Midlands-set novel (The Wall in the Head) celebrating what he says was a style born in 'an age of optimism' when 'architects were trying to build utopias. There's a lot of ambition, they were aiming for the sublime.'
He is thrilled it has become so mainstream that young hipsters have posters of concrete constructions on their walls and The Brutalist star Felicity Jones 'was on The One Show talking about growing up in Birmingham and seeing all the brutalist architecture there'. The movie, starring Adrien Brody as fictional Hungarian architect László Tóth, held its UK photo call at London's beloved rough-hewn labyrinth, the Barbican. Following its release, global Google searches for 'brutalism' have reached their highest in 20 years.
Contrary to its detractors, the aesthetic is not meant to denote brutality – béton brut in French simply means raw concrete. But we Brits have a stronger case than most for having invented it. The term was first used by Alison Smithson in 1953 for a house in London's Soho and some of the finest examples were scattered across the Midlands, from Birmingham Central Library (which succumbed to the wrecking ball in 2016) to the Grade II listed Coventry Central Baths.
By obtaining listed status, the Twentieth Century Society has helped to save several icons from demolition, including Preston Bus Station and the Richard Dunn Sports Centre in Bradford. But it is still fighting to rescue Birmingham's Ringway Centre and the '50p building', a polygonal tower in Croydon, south London – as well as decommissioned power station cooling towers across the country.
Gary Edwards, a 55-year-old Wolverhampton civil servant, has joined the robot makers, after seeing the petition online. 'I was born in the same year as that building,' he says. 'I'd say its values are my values, traditional Wilsonite Labour values – you include people from the community in the arts. Without it, we would lose a sense of place. I know it doesn't look like it, because it looks like a milk crate.
'It wasn't a popular building when it was first built. But it is now part of our psyche and part of our skyline. If it vanished, people might feel there's a hole there, especially if they replace it with something nondescript. Or, even worse – something that looks like it could come from London.'
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