C O N T E X T 1 2 4 : M A Y 2 0 1 2 45 Book reviews Keyhole surgery Renewing Old Edinburgh: the enduring legacy of Patrick Geddes Jim Johnson and Lou Rosenburg, Argyll Publishing, 2010, 288pp, ISBN 978 1 906134 49 5, £14.99 When I first settled in Edinburgh in the late 1960s, working and living in the then ‘at risk’ New Town, the recently published The Making of Classical Edinburgh 1750–1840 provided an unrivalled understanding of this outstanding example of planned urban expansion.Written by the economic historian Alexander Youngson and complemented by Edwin Smith’s evocative black-andwhite photographs, it remains in print – a classic in every sense. When the nobility and emerging middle classes decanted from the Old to the New Town, they left a cultural and socio-economic void, with disastrous consequences for public health. Charles Dickens recounted in 1858: ‘In the closes and wynds of that picturesque place I am sorry to remind you what fast friends picturesqueness and typhus often are.We saw more poverty and sickness in an hour than many people would believe in a life.’ This new book’s co-authors, architect Jim Johnson, formerly director of the Edinburgh Old Town Committee for Conservation and Renewal (EOTCCR), and economist/ town planner Lou Rosenburg, bring a wealth of professional commitment and personal knowledge to the daunting task of unravelling the complex history of 150 years of urban renewal at the heart of the Scottish capital. From its starting point in 1860 to the present-day, the book relates the complex oscillation between a tendency for large-scale interventions – from the Haussmannisation of the 1867 Chambers Scheme, through post-war plans for an inner ring road, to the contested Caltongate scheme which remains alive today – and the Geddesian incremental approach of ‘conservative surgery’. Much of the story is dominated by what were previously termed ‘sanitary improvements’: the de-densification of the urban grain and improvement of the housing stock to restore confidence in the Old Town as a place of residence for a socially mixed population. Patrick Geddes’ pivotal involvement in contesting the Haussmann approach began in the 1880s, both through local civic organisations and direct action. Symbolising this, the front cover illustrates Geddes’s development in the Lawnmarket, for which Jim Johnson as EOTCCR director and I as architect for its 1980s renovation promoted what at the time was considered the ‘daring’ terracotta colour scheme. Renewing Old Edinburgh is impeccably researched and well-balanced. It takes us through the complex trends in public and private investment, the institutional, legislative and financial frameworks, and relates these to national housing policy and international events. One of the hitherto unsung heroes to emerge is Ebenezer MacRae, city architect from 1925 to 1946. He astutely applied national legislation that was intended for slum clearance to projects of selective rehabilitation and renewal, developing his own distinctive interpretation of the traditionalist movement – a contextually sensitive stone-built urban vernacular. The 1930s also saw mounting pressures for institutional expansion. Modernist interventionism reached its apogee with the 1949 Abercrombie Plan and comprehensive redevelopment proposals for the south side led by the university. It is with obvious relief that the authors report the 1973 oil price hike as a decisive factor in scuttling the most destructive of these projects, thereby removing blight from large tracts of the Old Town including, ironically, threatened parts of the Chambers Scheme. The authors challenge the commonly-held assumption that Geddes had little impact in his native land. Rather, they promote the alternative view that, whether directly or by osmosis, conservative surgery has played a determining role in guiding the predominant pattern of urban renewal. As such, the book relates a story that has not previously been told. Beautifully and comprehensively illustrated, it is a worthy complement to that earlier classic, The Making of Classical Edinburgh. Dennis Rodwell, architect-planner, consultant in cultural heritage and sustainable urban development Britain in brick Brick and Clay Building in Britain RW Brunskill,Yale University Press, 2009, 262pp, 197 b&w illustrations, hardback, ISBN 978 0 300 11687 8, £30 It has sometimes been observed that brickwork, given its near ubiquity over much of lowland Britain, is a neglected subject for lectures. Unless we work in the uplands, or along the limestone belt, almost all of us have to consider the selection, use and repair of brickwork on a daily basis. Perhaps this constant contact breeds a familiarity which gradually numbs the practitioner to the variety of the material and the sheer range of ways
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