The subjects of castles, houses, industrial and civic buildings are all introduced in an authoritative and informative manner, which still allows room for the odd quirky feature (of which there seem to be a few in Dumfries and Galloway). My favourite is the 19th century bronze in Dryfesdale Parish Church, dedicated to a cavalry officer, Lt. Col. Douglas, "which shows a horse as the chief, indeed only, mourner". As with the other volumes in the series, there are details of many other fascinating buildings, structures, and monuments. To find out more, you'll just have to buy it! Collette Hall Latedecisionsof the century The conservation of twentieth century historic buildings. Edited by Peter Burman, Keith Gamer & Leo Schmidt. Proceedings of Conference held at IAASMay 1993. Pub. IAAS1996. 130pp with b/w illus. Softback. ISBN O 904761 36 3. £30.00. As Peter Burman says, in his introductory article, the conference was the first to be held on the subject of conserving modem buildings, so it may be considered unfortunate that the follow-up papers have taken over three years to produce; yet to balance the equation it must be said that this is still a valuable compendium of relevant issues. It comprises 21 articles, mainly from British contributors, though some effective continental case studies are included - not surprisingly - from eastern Europe. The scene is set by Diane Kay's concise contribution on the listing process. This particular article is brought up to date but given the three-year gap between conference and publication it would have been helpful to know whether all the other articles have been similarly updated. This applies particularly to the contribution of American Thomas C.Jester, who has worked up a seemingly valuable database to encompass relevant conservation specialists and techniques as well as architectural details. The philosophies of what we should be trying to conserve are also well considered. Are we seeking to keep all the original concept of a building or just its external architectural appearance - and how imporContex5t 4 June1997 tant is the actual historic fabric? One of the most satisfying aspects of these papers is the coverage of practical conservation problems whether tackled by Ingval Maxwell and William Allen in their articles on constructional metals and concrete or some of the case studies, particularly those of John Allan and the eastern European contributors. Leo Schmidt's study of the short term post-war housing, Die Hutte in Freiburg, encapsulates the difficulties of dealing with consciously ephemeral materials and structures. What a contrast to some of the case study contributions of British architects who concentrated more on their own architectural intervention and substantial remodelling of buildings than benign conservation; though, to be fair, the former is looking at 'museum' preservation rather than the upgrading and continuing use being considered by Peter Inskip for Lutyens' Britannic House or Rob Dunton for student accommodation at Magdelene College, Cambridge. How both to conserve and continue to use buildings designed on the well-understood principle of form-followingfunction is a theme that occurs repeatedly through many of the articles. This is seen as going very much hand-in-hand with providing for society's ever changing standards. A particularly valuable contribution is made by Hilary Chambers on social housing. While Tim Ellis' article on churches is of interest in the historical perspective, one is left with the impression that the underlying problem of upgrading and reusing churches is a universal one. In the light of all these concerns and problems, one can see the reasoning in concluding the proceedings with Sir Andrew Derbyshire's questioning of the whole concept of conserving Modem Movement architecture at all! - though he does nothing to set the conservation of 20th century buildings in any general context. For all the specific problems, many recurring conundrums apply to all periods of building and architectural styles. For readers unable to attend the conference, other reservations about this volume besides the lack of clarity as to any updating are a lack of an introductory note as to how the contributions were selected (particularly the single contribution on the Garden CityMovement about conservation approaches for Port Sunlight) and any conclusions or views which might have emerged from any discussions. These would have made a helpful footnote. The general impression is that articles have appeared in the order of their conference presentation rather than to attempt some thematic regrouping. It is also assumed that illustrations have been pared down to limit production costs - though the book is not particularly cheap. It is disappointing that the photographs and drawings used are so few and, in many cases, so small especially as the proceedings stem from a conference where, presumably, illustrations were plentiful. Nevertheless if anyone wishes to invest in one volume on 20th century building conservation they could certainly do much worse than select this compilation. Liz Marten EastAnglianrambles: Part 1 Tbe Buildings qf England- Nori olk 1: Norwich & North east Norfolk. Nikolaus Pevsner & Bill Wilson. Founding editor: Nikolaus Pevsner, Advisory editor:John Newman. Penguin. 1997. 798pp. 130 b+w photos+ drwgs, engravings & maps. 12 X 20 cm. Hardback. ISBN O 14 071058 2. £30.00. This eagerly awaited revision has taken eight years of meticulous preparation. It replaces what seems now a remarkably slim original edition which in its smaller format appeared in 1962 and ran to 390 pages for the princely sum of twenty-one shillings. The layout will be familiar to regular readers of Context. The 150 or so pages of the Introduction give a thorough picture of the surprisingly varied topography of a county often thought to be rather flat; to the geology which provides a limited but distinctive range of building materials - particularly flint; to various aspects of pre-history, particularly Iron Age, Roman and Saxon archaeology before dealing with aspects of architectural historywhich have been particularly well researched in the modern era and which have allowed expansion of the text BOOKS to accommodate current thinking. While the list of acknowledgements is long it seems a pity that the former practice of acknowledging specific revisions and contributions by other authors to the text has now been dropped. Perhaps this would have been too complicated in so complete a reworking. The sections on the vernacular buildings of the 13th century to 1550 covers an area which might have been anathema to Pevsner as being 'impolite architecture'. This did not justify separate thematic commentary 35 years ago but is fundamental to our present appreciation of our heritage. This aspect is sadly not reflected in the illustrations. These concentrate more on the great ecclesiastical heritage of the county and the importance of its many unfamiliar, inaccessible and under-regarded minor country houses. The former are justifiable famous and comprehensively discussed and photographed; the latter are surprisingly obscure but the two sections on architecture 1550-1700 and 1700-1820 help put the houses before a wider audience. As might be expected, the county and this volume are dominated by Norwich. In the late Middle Ages this was the largest and wealthiest city in England after London. As a 'complete' city, with cathedral, a mediaeval castle on a mound, partial city walls, an admittedly disturbed mediaeval core and 35 mediaeval churches, there is a great deal to describe in detail. The Norwich text has now doubled in length from 88 pages to about 177 and moved from its strict alphabetical mid-order in the first edition to pride of place following the Introduction in the current one. There are great discoveries throughout the new edition and almost all the entries are significantly expanded or revised. Unfortunately whereas layouts and flooplans and elevations are expertly rendered, the location and street maps maintain a tradition of irritatingly almost amateurish hand-drawn presentation compounded by not locating many of the buildings described. This is a small failing but one area where the cartographic liberation front has not yet penetrated. Overall, the new edition is Continued on page 48 45
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