CONTEXT 178 : DECEMBER 2023 51 Vox pop Iona Gibson Where and when did you train as an architect? I did one year at the Colchester School of Art and then in 1950 I studied at the Regent Street Polytechnic. What first inspired you to become an architect? A visit to my father’s architect cousin, Jean Reid, in Edinburgh, where she worked in the planning department. She gave me a copy of Sir Banister Fletcher’s A History of Architecture, which I found fascinating. It kept me occupied later when I was bed-bound with a bad attack of chickenpox. What drew you to the world of conservation? Having returned from Canada and Jamaica, where I worked for two years, I joined Donald Insall in 1959. At that time there were only four people working with him and the practice operated from his flat. I was taken on initially to design a new group of houses adjacent to the attractive village of Shincliffe near Durham. My role in the practice continued as the designer of contemporary buildings for sensitive sites, and initiating improvements to and new uses for historic buildings. I designed various housing schemes, many in and around Durham. I worked at Donald Insall’s for 48 years. How has the field of conservation architecture evolved? When I first joined Donald Insall’s it was common to demolish historic buildings and country houses. The major changes include the growth of amenity groups; the higher profile of SPAB; the increase in the numbers of conservation officers and associations such as the IHBC; the expansion of the listing system; projects shown on television such as the Restoration series and the Reconstruction of Notre Dame; Iona Gibson at Palladio’s Villa Cornaro in 1969
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MjgyMjA=