Context 153 - March 2018

10 C O N T E X T 1 5 3 : M A R C H 2 0 1 8 timber salvage and reuse, durability, thermal performance, and the use and potential difficulties arising from the chemicals used for adhesives and preservatives. She makes a persuasive case for developing an integrated and comprehensive sustainable approach based on an examination of modern materials, integrated within a larger set of heritage values. This issue of the Journal of Architectural Conservation carries three papers on traditional construction techniques, providing interesting perspectives on building methods and a contrasting window on UK-based experience. These three are a detailed discussion on the evolution and rationalisation of timber-framing in the second half of the 19th century, observed in the dwellings of Istanbul; a historical overview of the criteria and techniques for reducing the deformability of timber structures, citing a number of 18th-century Italian examples; and a construction technique using hollow ceramic elements typical of historic buildings in Calabria. With the outcome of Brexit unknown and a high probability that none of David Davis’s 58 sector EU briefing papers would ever have considered culture, let alone the historic environment, there has been a distinct reluctance to consider the implications of departure for the sector. It is therefore useful that The Historic Environment: policy and practice (Vol 8, No 3, 2017) dipped its toe in the water, albeit with more of an archaeological than buildings conservation bias, based on a CIfA conference ‘A Broader Vision for Brexit’, held in Newcastle last April. The debate has moved on since then, although the general outlook is no clearer. The contributors had to present what could be no more than snapshots of the early perceptions about Brexit and heritage, and even these pre-dated the unexpected outcome of the June 2017 election. The papers to some extent capture the sector’s hopes and fears emerging during the process and speculate on what the future holds. So the views are very personal, somewhat journalistic in style and unknowing about the government’s stance, as the relevant officials seemed to have no clue themselves (and still do not). It appears that we must hope our fellow professional European counterparts will view us with kindness and sympathy. Given the inevitable brevity of the eight Brexit papers, the issue was still able to include papers on other matters, including a substantial one by Tolina and Vesselin Loulanski on European heritage at risk, related to the numerous Thracian burial mounds in Bulgaria and how these should be managed now that a quarter century has passed since the collapse of the Soviet bloc. Given questionable issues surrounding patriotism and Brexit, the paper by Chao-Shiang Li on Taiwan’s industrial heritage offers a timely perspective on how heritage management is often tied to national identity, and defined more by political and social priorities than notions of appropriate heritage principles. The latest issue of The Historic Environment: policy and practice (Vol 8, No 4, 2017) reflects its international remit with four lengthy papers reflecting the complexities and different perspectives of heritage management beyond the UK. Of particular interest may be the paper by Sveinung Krokann Berg of the Norwegian Institute for Cultural Heritage, who looks at adaptive reuse and the regeneration of industrial heritage by examining four former industrial sites going through that process. Having interviewed the developers, Berg has examined the relationship between the perception of the heritage value of these sites and whether this had an influence on their commercial investment and added value. The author raises some interesting questions about the ways in which the economic perspective about the historic environment have changed in the modern era. In a paper on the complexities of Ottoman timber housing in the Suleymaniye World Heritage Site in Istanbul, Gülhan Benli and Tuna Kan explain the use of modern digital recording to record vernacular architecture.While the technology is now well established, it is useful that the authors can demonstrate how this methodology can be effectively applied. The conservation of earthen vernacular architecture house building discussed by Beria Bayizitlioğlu’ refers to the revival of craft traditions in regions where they are seen to be more supportive of sustainability and carbon-neutral objectives. The author cites a number of cases, including dwellings in Plovdiv, Bulgaria’s second largest city, Santa Barbara, California, and The Carse of Gowrie, Scotland. The mixture of insightful articles on iconic buildings, reviews, quirky ephemera and detailed casework reports always makes C20 , the magazine of the Twentieth Century Society, a pleasure to read. Issue No 2, 2017, is no exception. Nicola Rutt describes the recent re-engineering of the remarkable glass saw-tooth roof on Stirling and Gowan’s Grade II* listed Engineering Building (1959–63) at Leicester University; David Levitt, a member of Patrick Hodgkinson’s design team for the Brunswick Centre (built 1967–72, listed Grade II in 2000) in Bloomsbury, London, recalling the many changes that affected the final design; and Peter Murray looks back at the radical houses of Michael Manser (an architect who was often a strident and sometimes frustrated critic of traditional conservation). The content of Construction History (Vol 32, No 2, 2017) reflects its global