Urban Jigsaw

27 April – 29 May 2016

This display represented the culmination of a project that I launched at the Royal Academy of Arts in 2015, which invited architects to develop speculative proposals for brownfield sites across London. The architects – Chetwoods, Alma-nac, Atelier Kite and MaccreanorLavington with East – developed proposals for a network of creative spaces around Waterloo, the transformation of redundant underground railway into a logistics line, a new housing typology based on a communal kitchen, and a rethinking of the urban manifestation of law courts. Read more

Mavericks installation, January 2016. © Francis Ware

Mavericks: Breaking the Mould of British Architecture

26 January – 20 April 2016

Conceived in conjunction with my book of the same name, and designed by the practice ScottWhitbyStudio, this innovative installation took a colourful look at the course of British architecture through twelve maverick architects: Smythson, Vanbrugh, Wyatt, Soane, Cockerell, Mackintosh, Holden, Goodhart-Rendel, Stirling, Price, FAT and Hadid. Read more

The Guts, New Islington, Manchester, 2009–12 by mæ. Photo © Tim Soar

Four Visions for the Future of Housing

7 February – 17 May 2015

What might the future hold for housing in the UK? What are the challenges faced now and how can they be overcome? I put these questions to Mæ Architects, Dallas Pierce Quintero, 5th Studio and Sarah Wigglesworth Architects who came up with a range of intriguing visions which provided the basis for this well received exhibition. Informed by new and emerging approaches to housing and the way we live, the exhibition pointed towards a future for housing in the UK that is full of possibilities. Read more

100 Buildings 100 Years: Views of British Architecture since 1914

11 October 2014 – 1 February 2015

Organised in conjunction with the Twentieth Century Society, I co-curated this exhibition showcasing the extraordinary and often surprising variety of a hundred years of British architecture. It proved highly popular with the public and was covered in a range of press publications. Towards the end of the exhibition’s run I chaired a ‘balloon debate’ that sought to find Britain’s greatest twentieth-century building. The event proved to be a great success, acting as a lively and accessible way into the ongoing discussion about our recent architectural past. Read more

Billowing Glowing, 2014. © WestonWilliamson+Partners / (uncommon) landscape / Yinka Shonibare MBE RA

Reimagining Mayfair: London's next cultural quarter?

19 – 21 September 2014

In partnership with the Architects’ Journal, I launched an open call for architect-led teams to put forward bold new ideas for reimagining the area of Mayfair directly to the north of the RA’s Burlington Gardens building. The results by DK-CM and Pablo Bronstein; Andrew Phillips, Vogt and Henry Coleman; EPR Architects; Yinka Shonibare MBE, Weston Williamson Architects and (uncommon) landscape were exhibited at a ‘pop-up’ exhibition in September 2014, and played a significant role in the RA’s stakeholder engagement strategy with the surrounding area as it embarked on a major building project. Read more

Same old, same old: An Exhibition by Blue Firth

2 February – 26 May 2013

I commissioned the artist, Blue Firth, to create a site-specific installation to explore the ways architecture informs and distorts our understanding of space, myth and history. Challenging preconceptions about architecture and how we respond to it, the exhibition was covered in a major feature in The Architects’ Journal.

Nicholas Hawksmoor: Architect of the Imagination

4 February – 17 June 2012

Marking the 350th anniversary of Hawksmoor’s birth, this innovative exhibition explored how his architecture continues to inspire and provoke the imagination. As part of the exhibition, I commissioned film interviews with the architect Ptolemy Dean, novelist Philip Pullman and poet Iain Sinclair, for which I acted as interviewer and co-director. The exhibition was covered on the BBC Culture Show and was reviewed or featured in The Wall Street Journal, The Times, TimeOut, The Telegraph Online, Icon, The Architects’ Journal, and The Architectural Review.

Re-creating Tatlin's Tower

23 September 2011 – 29 January 2012

I co-curated this exhibition that explored the genesis of Vladimir Tatlin’s Monument to the Third International, one of the greatest unbuilt projects of architectural history. The exhibition took place alongside the exhibition, Building the Revolution: Soviet Art and Architecture 1915–1935 and a (re)-creation of Tatlin’s tower in the RA’s Annenberg Courtyard.