Reading List

By Owen Hatherley

Hatherley is an entertaining critic and chronicler of modern architecture. This gazetteer of 20th century buildings in the UK is my ultimate reference book. Whenever I visit somewhere, I leaf through and plan which buildings should be added to the day’s itinerary.

By Elain Harwood

All you ever wanted to know about English architecture between 1945-75 is in this comprehensive and weighty tome.

By Elain Harwood

An excellent introduction to the highlights of brutalist buildings in Britain with informative text and appealing photographs.

By Geraint Franklin and Elain Harwood

Like its sister publication, Brutalist Britain, this book covers the glory years of post-modernist architecture of the 1980s and 1990s.

By Thomas Heatherwick

Designer of the Olympic Flame, Heatherwick is on a mission against the “blandemic” of boring buildings. I don’t agree with all he writes, but he has some thought provoking views.

By Zupagrafika

With an introduction by John Grindrod, this book contains press-out-and-build models of some of the best brutalist buildings in London.

By Ian Nairn

Recently republished by Notting Hill Editions, this book ‘by a layman for laymen’ has pithy notes on 260 buildings.

By David Rowan

This is the story in photographs of John Madin’s much-missed brutalist masterpeice, Birmingham Library. Its demolition in 2016 was the prompt I needed to start chronicling modern buildings before they disappeared.

By Gianluca Calise

Photos and words about post-war social housing and its transition from a utopian vision to it’s current-day private investment nadir.

Edited by Tom Benjamin

A collaborative zine filled with highlights of Bristol brutalism including Broadmead Baptist Church, Clifton Cathedral, Ruper St Car Park, Plimsoll Bridge and more.

A series of maps on 20th and 21st century architectural eras are a useful and informative resource for planning my photographic walks.

By Modernism in Metroland

An every growing series of mini-guides featuring modernist buildings of a particular location or architect.

By Richard Rogers

“This is in fact a manifesto. It encapsulates what I regard as the fundamental value - and values - of architecture.”

By John Grindrod

A well written, entertaining introduction to brutiful brutalism by one of our best writers about post-war buildings.