Birmingham: The Latest Architecture and News

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Home to the historic engineering firm, AE Harris, for over 50 years, Birmingham’s treasured Jewellery Quarter is being revamped on account of modernized manufacturing methods adopted by the company.

Joint venture partners Galliard Homes and Apsley House Capital are working alongside Glenn Howells Architects to transform the site into a residential-led, mixed-use hub for the quarter.

New images have been published of Grimshaw and Arup-designed stations for the UK’s ”High Speed 2” railway system. Connecting London to the British Midlands, the mega-infrastructure project will be the UK’s second high-speed rail system, with HS1 already connecting London and the South East to the Channel Tunnel.

The Grimshaw and WSP-designed Curzon Street station in Birmingham will be the first brand new intercity station to be built in Britain since the 1800s, while Interchange Station, designed by Arup, will serve as a gateway station to the West Midlands and Birmingham Airport.

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The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) has announced the first wave of their 2017 RIBA Regional Awards, beginning with the West Midlands region. Six projects were selected as winners from the region, which includes the city of Birmingham and its surrounding area.

“This year's winning projects prove that a good architecture should allow its user a space and time to absorb and to reflect,” commented Regional Jury Chair, Natalia Maximova. “The selected designs frame our experience of the buildings and spaces rather than dictate it. They highlight the fact that there is no true architecture without a clear vision and a strong concept. Originality remains a highly valued commodity and a source of inspiration for others and therefore should be recognised.

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A new housing complex in the form of 500 terraced units has been proposed by London practice Architects of Invention for the city of Birmingham, in response to its growing multicultural population. Drawing inspiration from the ancient Hanging Gardens of Babylon, Garden Hill’s formal composition is that of two staggered 25-storey towers, with private and communal gardens on each level of terraces.

With the project's swooping mass, the residences aim to offer panoramic views of Birmingham, given its central location in the Digbeth area, a 10-minute walk from the city center. Additionally, the staggered towers capture ample daylighting over the course of the day, with the south end benefitting from the morning sun and the north end in the evening.

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For this edition of The Urbanist, Monocle 24's weekly "guide to making better cities," the team visited the annual congress of the Academy of Urbanism to discuss how happiness and wellbeing can be achieved on the urban level. In this show Andrew Tuck and his correspondents spoke to architects, planners, designers and urbanists in an attempt to ascertain what makes a 'social city' for 'social animals', and which metropolises from around the world offer lessons that we can learn from.

Work has begun on the demolition of the UK city of Birmingham's former Central Library, designed by home-grown Brutalist architect John Madin. The move by Birmingham Council to not retain the structure of the library, in spite of ideas and petitions put forward by numerous public groups (including one titled Keep The Ziggurat), has been widely met with disappointment among the architectural community. The BBC recently compiled some of the most interesting ideas for reuse which included, among others, transforming the concrete structure into a new English Parliament, an international trade centre, and an enormous space for rock climbing.

Madin, who passed away in 2012, had at least three of his major Modernist projects demolished during his lifetime. His design for Birmingham Library had been met with criticism from the likes of the city's Director of Planning and Regeneration of the time who described it as a "concrete monstrosity." Prince Charles famously described it as "looking more like a place for burning books than keeping them."

See photographs of the former library under construction and in use after the break.

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The Royal Institute of British Architects have announced an international design competition to regenerate Centenary Square, one of Birmingham's largest public spaces, and neighbor to Birmingham's International Convention Centre, the Old Rep Theatre, and the the Library of Birmingham by Mecanoo which was shortlisted for the 2014 Stirling Prize.

Birmingham City Council has approved Make Architects' designs for the first commercial building of the city's Arena Central masterplan. Located on Broad Street and overlooking the historic Centenary Square, 1 Arena Central is set to be the first step in the master plan for the 9.2 acre site at the heart of Birmingham City Center Enterprise Zone. The eight story building, which will feature 135,000 square feet of Grade A office space, with 5,000 square feet of retail on the ground floor, is emblematic of the flagship development of the overall master plan.

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