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The Contradictions of Modernism

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Paradoxical Urbanism

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Abstract

This chapter extends the critical analysis of space in Chap. 3 by examining specific sites, beginning with the plan for the rebuilding of Plymouth after bombing in 1941, by Patrick Abercrombie. This produced a modernist city centre using a grid street plan. The plan was progressive in its aim to provide a well-designed space for all social classes, but relied on professional expertise and top-down methods. This approach characterises much in modern urbanism, and shaped debates in the International Congress of Modern Architecture (CIAM), which met in Hoddesdon, England, in 1951. Caught between inter-war modernist planning and post-war humanism, CIAM never resolved the dichotomy.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Hatherley, O. (2012) A New Kind of Bleak: Journeys Through Urban Britain, London, Verso, p. 179.

  2. 2.

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    Gould, J. (2010) Plymouth: Vision of a Modern City, Swindon, English Heritage, p. 5.

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    Dix, G. (1981) ‘Patrick Abercrombie,’ Cherry, G.E. Pioneers in British Planning, London, Architectural Press, p. 115.

  6. 6.

    Hatherley, A New Kind of Bleak, p. 181.

  7. 7.

    Gould, Plymouth, p. 7, citing Abercrombie, P. and Paton Watson, J. (1943) A Plan for Plymouth, Plymouth, Underhill, p. 67.

  8. 8.

    Foot, M. (c.1945) from Hoggart, S. and Leigh, D. (1981) Michael Foot: A Portrait, London, Hodder and Stoughton, p. 91, quoted in Powers, ‘Plymouth,’ p. 108.

  9. 9.

    Powers, ‘Plymouth,’ p. 101.

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  11. 11.

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  12. 12.

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  14. 14.

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  15. 15.

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  16. 16.

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  17. 17.

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  31. 31.

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    Curtis, ‘The Heart of the City,’ p. 53.

  34. 34.

    Abercrombie, P. and Paton Watson, J. [1945] Plan for Plymouth, Plymouth, Underhill, p.2, cited in Boughton, Municipal dreams, p. 62.

  35. 35.

    Boughton, Municipal Dreams, p. 66.

  36. 36.

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  41. 41.

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  42. 42.

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  43. 43.

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  44. 44.

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  45. 45.

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  46. 46.

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  47. 47.

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  48. 48.

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  49. 49.

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  52. 52.

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  53. 53.

    Undocumented personal memory, c.1996–67.

  54. 54.

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  57. 57.

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  58. 58.

    Lefebvre, ‘Notes on the New Town,’ p. 125.

  59. 59.

    Lefebvre, ‘Notes on the New Town,’ p. 125.

  60. 60.

    Personal memory, c.1993–94.

  61. 61.

    Sadler, S. (2000) ‘Open Ends: The Social Visions of Non-Planning,’ Hughes and Sadler, Non-Plan, p. 151.

  62. 62.

    Sadler, ‘Open Ends,’ p. 152.

  63. 63.

    Lefebvre, H. [1974] (1991) The Production of Space, Oxford, Blackwell, p. 229.

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  1. Bradford-on-Avon, UK

    Malcolm Miles

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Miles, M. (2021). The Contradictions of Modernism. In: Paradoxical Urbanism. Palgrave Pivot, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-6341-6_4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-6341-6_4

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  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Pivot, Singapore

  • Print ISBN: 978-981-15-6340-9

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