Jessica Kelly: The architect and the architectural press.

Episode 125 of A is for Architecture is a conversation with historian Dr Jessica Kelly, Reader in Design and Architectural History at London Metropolitan University. We discuss her 2022 book, No More Giants: J.M. Richards, Modernism and The Architectural Review, published by Manchester University Press.

It’s an interesting story, one that mirrors the development of the profession, and perhaps even produces it to some extent. As Jess says, ’I think Richards, although he would completely align himself, and he writes about being a modernist and seeing that as the future of architecture, he is also quite invested in the figure of the architect and the expertise of the architectural profession as a cultural elite, as a sort of guiding figure within society. And he wants to promote that the magazine is invested in promoting the profession, because as much as the Architectural Review is, as it's been described, a mouthpiece for modernism, and really does feature modernism a lot, it features a lot of other stuff as well. [there is] very much a plurality of conversations happening in [it]. […] I think for Richard and his circle and network of people, there is an overlap between [ideology and business and] the idea of whether someone's a consumer or a citizen blurs together in quite an interesting way. And for Richards and his contemporaries, their main objective is to get a public audience for what they understand to be the future of architecture.’

Jessica can be found on the London Met website, and the book is linked above.  

Thanks for listening.

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Music credits: ⁠Bruno Gillick