24 overburden to fall back over the tip to the full depth of the sinking and the pile was well and truly anchored. You can still pick out the outline of the 1866 pier, asserting itself, from within the overall shape of the present pier. The original pier is identified by establishing the positions of the six identical cast iron kiosks. Three are there, large as life, the other three may be positioned by the eagle eyed which manages to pick out the cluster of eight columns, on the points of a regular octagon, which supported them. Kiosks, selected from a profusely illustrated catalogue, were used to mark the free external angles of the entrance and pier-head platform. I like the quadrant shaped curves taking these two platforms into the more slender bridging element. These sit fitfully alongside the angular cants which frame the kiosks. Still commanding, the conglomerate southern pavilion bemuses the eye with its myriad shapes and complex, overlapping patterns, but you will see that the key element which perfects the architectural composition is the central Concert Hall. This is a fulcrum to be studied. It is eye catching and yet uncompetitive. Like a fabric marquee in a wealth of space, it has rounded ends which defer to both space and sister buildings. Success like that, we all know, is difficult to achieve. Though distinct, the three building masses here are not so far apart that their linkage is weak; all three profiles are curvilinear, equally complex in fine detail, have large, visually stable bases and agreeable high points of \C S () 10 tc metres -- ----- -·------------- ---- ------- climax Each straddles its spiky perch authoritively, looks inviting and serene and shares the same pedigree, nobility and scale. COMMON WILL Is all this to share the fate of Chain Pier, Brighton's first? Of course not. We shall see an extraordinary act of common will and the pier's external surfaces will be fully restored. New uses will then manifest themselves, as at Worthing's Lido, and interiors will be brought back to life by entrepreneurs in, some may say, quite common, awful ways. True, as everyone now accepts, some new building of smallish stature will be needed at the shore end. This will maintain the tradition and will be a modern, flowery, prefabricated metal building in one mass, or in a series of blending smaller structures from leading contemporary conservatory specialists. This town of Brighton has assets in superabundance. Walk its streets and you can experience every variety of townscape inventiveness. Enclosures, streets narrow and wide, squares, terminal and intermediate views of monuments (two, at least, of which are loos), churches , great tree' d greens, all manner of curves, hills and perspectives. Add to these one unique, onion domed royal palace and you are replete. But Brighton's 'fingers into the sea' are its singular and continuing achievement. Find the hooks, high on the cliff-face, which anchored the great suspension cables of Brighton's Chain Pier (1822 to 1896) and you can feel the stirrings of this CONTEXT 29 I
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