briefing notes: ian martin
When and where were you born?
London,1953.
What is your favourite building and why?
Forton Services, M6.Looks like something from Thunderbirds, and it's just before my turnoff.
What is your favourite meal/restaurant?
Anything with meat in, anywhere licensed.
What is your favourite film?
That clip of Margaret Thatcher falling over.
What is your favourite book?
The New Testament. It has a marvellous narrative flow, and harks back to a Golden Age when gratuitous violence required neither guns nor swearing.
Some brilliant one-liners, too.
What is your favourite 'design classic'?
The Draughtflow Widget.
What is the worst structure you've ever seen and why?
Wind turbines.They think they're so clever - but they can't even turn in unison!
Who or what is your biggest architectural influence and why?
Lubetkin (above): clever, funny and theoretically correct.
Who are your favourite contemporary architects?
Eyal Weizman/Rafi Segal, Dani Freixes, Will Alsop.And Dennis Pitt, who came round and sorted out my back wall in return for a pint.
What would your advice be to architectural students?
Take more drugs and skive as much as possible, but do try to eat properly.Old architects are wrong, dead ones are right.Avoid novelty rucksacks and any form of jazz, however 'harmless'.
What would your motto be?
Pulvis et umbra sumus.
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