(now
BUILT
ENVIRONMENT AND BIBLICAL THEOLOGY
MAKING
CONNECTIONS: DISCERNING RELATIONSHIPS
MICHAEL POWELL
Doctor of Philosophy February 2003
12
- TYPES AND PURPOSES: NEHEMIAH
Schools
began with a man under a tree, who
did not know he was a teacher... Spaces were erected and the
first schools became. (Louis Kahn)
12.1
Purpose
The purpose of this Section is to consider materials
that relate to wide-ranging types and purposes of buildings and other
structures in
This information is drawn centripetally towards
theological questions about the overall nature of the societies, of which the
buildings and structures are manifestations.
12.2
Nature of the theme
In relation to
In relation to
In neither case is housing considered as it is the
subject of Section 14.
Categories such as these indicating use are not the
only ways of typing. Approaches taken to typing has a fundamental effect
on haw built environments are perceived
12.3
Discussing the late fourteenth century, Grieve
considers the matter of the water conduit, first constructed by the
Friars. The water supply came from a spring half a mile outside the town. It
was led underground in pipes made of elm across the open country and down
Tuckwell (2001) has produced a comprehensive history of
King Edward VI Grammar School (KEGS).The school was re-founded in 1551,
having existed earlier as a chantry school. The new foundation was located in
the former Black Friars' buildings in
By the 1870's the site had become very constricted and
unsuitable. Some land had been taken to give access to the market behind the
school. The proximity of the Coach and Horses created somewhat unsavoury
conditions, as might the board of health's proposal `to build a public urinal
close to the headmaster's gate in
King Edward's Avenue cuts right down to what was once
the school field. This stretched down to the market and was surrounded by a
high wall and rows of very beautiful trees of various kinds, including a
magnificent mulberry. The field was really pretty, especially from the market
end looking towards the picturesque rear view of the old-fashioned buildings,
with St Mary's in the background.
(Tuckwell 2001:64, quoting The Chelmsfordian of
December 1933)
The governors and headmaster, faced with a pupil's
death from diphtheria, were more concerned with health than with romantic
townscape. Thirteen architects took part in a design competition for new
buildings, at the same time as local argument waged on whether the existing
site, with its health hazards, or a new site should be used. Ultimately a
design by Henry Cheers was erected on a virgin site in Broomfield Road, where
the school is still located, and opened on 29t' June 1892. The
local architect, Frederic Chancellor, purchased the old site. The cost of the
new building exceeded the estimates by 14%, causing the governors major
financial problems. A problem of aesthetics arose, concerning the proposal to
build three sides in red brick and one in yellow. The governors regarded this
as an offence to good taste, not appropriate to a country site. Laboratories
were added in 1899.
The campus made a good impression on the
I was struck by the substantial and imposing
character of the buildings externally. .. In addition to the usual large
schoolroom and classrooms, with dormitories for boarders, there were a
gymnasium, two laboratories, and, just on the point of completion, a
carpenter's shop with a quite surprising array of benches and tools.
(Tuckwell 2001:71)
On the new site, in a new educational climate, the
school prospered. In 1909, the headmaster, speaking to parents, emphasised to
whom it really belonged:
Ladies and Gentlemen of the
(Tuckweil 2001:108)
In the years between 1909 and 1914, many additions and
improvements were made, such as the construction of a sanatorium, installation
of central heating `from a stokehold' and the provision of changing rooms. The
Chelmsfordian concluded `When the whole plan is carried out it will indeed
be a puzzle to find anywhere a more beautifully built or more beautifully
equipped grammar school for a town of this size.' (Tuckwell 2001:111).
However, as James Fenton discovered in
Further building work was carried out in 1936:
This term constant rains have turned parts of our
surroundings into a slough, and building operations have turned the whole
place into a scene of chaos through which it is quite as difficult and
disheartening to thread one's way as through any legendary swamp.
(Tuckwell 2001:135)
Beauty returned on VE Day in 1945:
The floodlighting of the school on VE day....
expressed as could nothing else the complex of feelings which the occasion
aroused. We have suffered a good deal from the menace of darkness in many ways
and on many planes of experience, and so what could be more fitting than that,
presenting as it did such a stirring and beautiful spectacle?
(Tuckwell 2001:149)
Chaos was back in 1973 when it was discovered
that High Alumina Cement had been used in the construction of some post-war
buildings: `There was a danger of collapse.... The offending buildings had to
be underpinned and supported while remedial work took place. The entrance
foyer was a jungle of props...' (Tuckwell 2001:172). Tuckwell continues:
'Perversely the boys showed that buildings do not matter all that much by
producing the best ever Oxbridge results in January 1975... The following
summer's A-level results followed suit with a record 84% pass-rate.' (Tuckwell
2001:172).
While short-term crises with buildings may not matter
all that much, long-term underinvestment and failure in maintenance does.
Long-running and deep-seated uncertainties on whether KEGS
The
450th anniversary in 2001 was marked by a £lm building appeal by
the governors. In spite of difficulties of many kinds, not least with
buildings, Tuckwell concludes that a description of the school given by Sir
Thomas Mildmay nearly 450 years ago still holds good, `a wholesome and
gentleman-like house'. (Tuckwell 2001:189).
Booker (1990) contributes a text on the architecture of
banks. The earliest reference in
Of the joint-stock banks, the first to be
mentioned is Barclays in the High Street. The architects were Sir Arthur and
AC Blomfield, architects to the Bank of England. `The first of AC Blomfield's
branches was probably
Lee (2001), in the course of her text celebrating the
centenary on
At Writtle, an ex-army hut from World War I became, in
1922-3, the location for the transmission of radio signals. After thirty years
service as a school sports pavilion, the hut has been relocated on an
industrial heritage site at Sandford Mill. In the footsteps of Marconi is a guide prepared by Chelmsford Borough
Council, enabling one to trace a path from the Marconi memorial window in
Writtle church, past the site of the hut,3 into town and past the
Writtle Road Factory acquired when Marconi took over Grompton's electrical
engineering business in 1968, and, after visiting various newer factory sites,
reaching New Street and Hall Street. The journey continues to Sandford Mill
and a transmission mast at Great Baddow.
The contemporary significance of Marconi is summed up
by Lee:
The Marconi companies have made profound changes in the
world of communications. The development of modern transistors and integrated
circuits has led to a new era of practical electronics through the
wide-ranging use of radio communications; radar installations; Intelsat; space
communication; computers and microprocessors. In addition, they have produced
digital data networks and the lifesaving Argus thermal imaging camera.
Today, despite reorganisation and redistribution of manufacturing and research
interests,
(Lee 2001:14)
With hi-tech industry such as this, the buildings
communicate nothing of what is happening inside them. They act as walls,
screens or envelopes. Particularry in the case of products for defence
industries, confidentiality and security are of great importance.
Perhaps
the most significant contemporary development in
The first academic building to be constructed was the
Queen's Building, whose principal purpose is to house the Learning Resource
Centre. Smith and Pitts (1997) adduce this building as an example of
innovative, energy efficient design. The use of thermal mass, natural
ventilation promoted by the stack effect, and the maximisation of daylighting
are the principal features of the building. The building energy management
system has been designed `to look after itself (Smith and Pitts 1997:77). The
combination of these technical features with a fast-track design and
construction programme gives the building a significant place in late
twentieth century utilitarian architecture.
Currently (late 2002) under construction is the
The building - to be known as the Michael A
Ashcroft building - was the subject of a Royal Institute of British Architects
design competition..........
A glass-fronted entrance will welcome visitors to
the new
Leading from the central entrance area is the
main wing of teaching, seminar and support accommodation. This space is
arranged over four storeys. An additional storey, however, has been proposed
that would provide a rooftop pavilion area complete with an external
south-facing terrace. A River Wall constructed from transparent and
translucent materials will follow the line of the nearby riverside walk.
(
The main non-academic building on the campus is the
student village. This comprises some 550 study-bedrooms in flats of four or
five. The rooms themselves are generally regarded as adequate. The main
criticisms of the village are that in individual flats the only shared room is
the kitchen-diner and that there is no student common room or similar facility
in or close to the village. This reflects government funding regimes for
student accommodation.
Essex
Record Office Update (2000) provides a comprehensive description of the new
building for the Essex Record Office opened in March 2000. The
functional heart of the building is the repository:
At the heart of the new Record Office stands the
repository - the brick cube that dominates the site and protects the
collections- The outside is almost featureless. All that the visitor sees is a
solid three-storey block, capped by a lightly constructed plant room. Parts of
the brickwork re-appear in the public foyer as a reminder of the building's
purpose... [This] strongly built and windowless box (made from 337 000
bricks!) provides not merely physical security but also a high degree of
thermal inertia, allowing the Record Office to achieve and maintain the
prescribed levels of temperature and relative humidity without relying
entirely on air-conditioning.
(Essex Record Office Update No 35 pp1-3)
Specialist rooms are provided for photographic records,
magnetic media and conservation workshops. Public areas include the search
room, lecture theatres and exhibition space.
12.4
A somewhat different selection of types of building has
been chosen for
As one travels between the Rubicon and
All
of a sudden the road emerges from the bush and you are confronted with the
most magnificent country you could ever hope to see. Smooth, low hills and
gentle valleys. The bright green of rich pasture and the dark chocolate of
rich soil...
(Evers and Ingpen 1978:46)
They go on to tell of an eighty-four year-ofd resident,
Tom McKenna, `surrounded by land and buildings that represent four generations
of family achievement, of overcoming adversity, of hard and good work being
duly rewarded'. (Evers and Ingpen 1978:46).
The authentic but impressionistic approach of Evans and
Ingpen can be balanced with some comments on farm buildings from Morgan. While
her work relates to the 1820's and to the
Latrobe is the home of what is now the
... a committee was formed and they immediately set
about taking steps to gather together sufficient funds for the erection of a
hospital. When enough money had been collected an application was made to the
government for a site next to the Latrobe recreation ground, and this was
readily agreed to. Mr E Gadsby was selected to be the architect and builder,
and he submitted plans of a building which he estimated would cost £500. It
was to be of wood with a frontage of 63 feet, and it was to contain four rooms
for beds, besides committee, operating and nurses' rooms, and it was also to
have detached outbuildings comprising kitchen, scullery and servants' bedroom.
The front of the building was to be of an ornamental nature, the two large
wards to have bay windows 11 feet by 4 feet 6 inches with a connecting
verandah between them.
(Ramsay 1957,1980:192)
The present hospital has grown by stages. A General
Division, the present main building, was opened in 1961, the State's Director
General of Health Services noting that `the newlyopened General Division
exhibits the latest in design and equipment of a modern
In his history of Devonport, Binks (1981) sets out the
key events in the industrial and commercial development of the City, relating
them to infrastructure construction. In 1851 settlers took up land on
the east bank of the
Continuous growth continued from the 1850's to the
1880's, when efforts to reduce and control the harbour bar were successful and
the railway was extended from Deloraine and Latrobe to Formby. `The railway
brought a building boom to Formby.... Apart from warehouses, shops, hotels and
stores appeared, the new post office was opened in 1892 and large numbers of
houses were built for the growing population.' (Binks 1981:35). The Bank of
Van Diemen's Land, the Bank of Australasia and the National Bank of
A listing of plaques on buildings in Devonport includes
those on a number of hotels. Typical of the hotels is the Formby
on the riverside in
In addition, the plaques give insights into the nature
of some social and cultural buildings. The Majestic Theatre, built in
1915 by the Lane family, had seating for 250 in leather seats a further 500 in
wooden seats. A sister theatre was located in Latrobe, films being shown first
in Devonport and then dispatched to Latrobe where the audience would be
waiting. Clubs included the Devonport Club, which was in being from 1899 until
1975. It was built by George Levy at a cost of £600. The Mersey Valley
Workers Club shared its premises with the North-West Post newspaper, first
printed in 1887. The former
Stubbs
(1998) relates the history of the Anglican Church in
The building is of Gothic design with bluestone
foundations and stained cement dressings, and is tuck-pointed inside and out.
Spreyton bricks have been used throughout. The roof inside is panelled with
Oregon, panelled out in New Zealand white pine, while on the outside it is
covered with iron, painted a slate colour.
(Stubbs 1998:19)
The description goes on to give details of windows,
floor, ventilation and lighting. It concludes with praise for the builder: `Mr
Hiller has carried out his contract well. He entrusted the plastering to Mr FH
Bergmann and the painting and decoration to Mr Beale'. (Stubbs 1998:19).
Happily for this thesis, the two large windows in the west wall are of St John
the Apostle and of Jesus healing the blind man (John 9:1-41).
This first phase of building at
In 1939 consideration was given to the construction of
the chancel and in 1942 plans were commissioned from Mr Louis Williams, an
eminent ecciesiastical architect in
In 1954 the building committee was set up.... A
versatile team of parishioners headed it. Mr Tim Jacobs, the chairman, was a
headmaster, Mr Ted Smith, the vice-chairman was manager of a wholesale
business; Mr Walter Gerard, the secretary, was a teacher; Mr William Kildey...
[and] Mr Amold Wertheimer [successive treasurers, were accountants].... It was
decided not to call tenders but to ask another parishioner, Mr Ken Titmus, a
master builder, to undertake the position of contractor. He accepted.
(Stubbs 1998:25)
The enterprising Mr Titmus visited brickyards and found
the moulds with which the bricks for the nave had been made. To use them again
would necessitate hand pressing. Mr Aubrey Luck, the brick maker, agreed to
fire two hundred or so every time his kiln was used for machine-made bricks.
Mr Reuben Kent, the bricklayer, offered to modify his schedule to accommodate
this slow method of supply and `to wait at times should the supply of handmade
bricks be held up'. (Stubbs 1998:26). A minor link to Witham,
An unexpected building site that is due to open up in
late 2001 is that of the
12.5
General Built Environment texts
The above materials relating to
Two ways of ordering are put forward here, the first by
means of typologies and the second by questions concerning the values being
promulgated.
It is the task of typology to bring order. Such can be
a creative or a constricting process. Schneekloth and Franck (1994)
comment on the power of such typing in terms of prison and promise: `One of
the prisons we create and inhabit is an intellectual one: expecting and
searching for fixed, clear and separable definitions and applications of type
and typing where, instead, we could recognize their variable and contrasting
meaning and uses'. (Schneekloth and Franck 1994:31).
Promise can come about through the openness of
boundaries: `typing, as an activity and type as a form of knowledge are
impossible to confine. Their fluidity and ambiguity defy definition. Type can
refer to ways of structuring the built landscape where the boundaries are
blurred and categories overlap. The type categories are fluid, the embodiment
of essence, often emerging from experience of the world, and respecting
differences and overlaps in specimens... `. (Schneekloth and Franck 1994:31).
Paradoxically, `Type will always be a prison and a promise because it will
always be open and closed at the same time....'. (Schneekloth and Franck
1994:35).
Typing can be repressive or transformative:
Typing is powerful and flexible, pervasive and useful;
it enables our comprehension of, and living in, the world. But type thinking
is also a prison that inhibits our inhabitation. Too often we forget that type
is a constructed overlay on the world, that we (or others) made it and thus
remake the world every day............... While changes in types can be
transformative, supporting a more socially just and economically sound world,
the changes can be, and often are, repressive and unjust.
( Schneekloth and Franck 1994:32)
Franck (1994) in her individual paper
puts forward a web of building types relating to purpose:
REMOVAL AND CONTROL
Schools, prisons, hospitals, asylums, [various categories of multiple
housing].
RETREAT AND ESCAPE
Parks, restaurants, cafes, theatres, nightclubs, health clubs, resorts,
hotels, amusement parks, theme parks, museums, beaches, spas,
golf courses and shopping
malls.
Churches, libraries, convents, monasteries. Single
family homes.
PROTECTING
&
HONOURING
Churches, synagogues, mosques, cemeteries, memorials, monuments,
battlefields, museums, historic landmarks and districts, wildemess areas,
national parks, city halls, state and national capital buildings, courthouses,
and possibly libraries and universities. Single family homes.
PRODUCING AND
CONTROLLING CAPITAL
Indoor markets, factories, mills, mines, warehouses, railroad stations,
banks, office buildings, stock exchanges, shopping centres and malls,
industrial
parks.
PUBLIC SERVICE
Retail stores and commercial services.
Streets,
sidewalks, highways, parking lots, train, bus and subway stations.
Airports,
banks, schools, hospitals, clinics, libraries, day-care centres, post offices.
ENABLING AND
EMPOWERING
Libraries, schools, universities, town halls, state and national
capitals, religious buildings, buildings for fraternal and charity
organizations.
Co-op
food stores, local green markets, community workshops.
The value of Franck's work is in the categories into
which she places building types. The category says what, in her view as the
classifier, that particular type of building does to human beings.
King (1980) brings together nine
essays around the theme of built form and social form. These relate to types
such as asylums, hospitals, prisons, temples, offices, places of refreshment
and homes. He poses the parallel questions:
What can we understand about a society by
examining its buildings and physical environment?
What can we understand about buildings and environments
by examining the society in which they exist?
(King 1980:1)
In the consideration of any building or, we might add,
built environment or type, the crucial questions are:
Whose ideas,
Whose
beliefs,
Whose values or
Whose view of the world
are
being considered here?
(King 1980:31)
12.6
General Biblical Theology texts
Schreiter (1985)
advocates the construction of various types of local theologies. Today, he
says, `The churches of Latin America, Africa, Asia and Oceania are not
satisfied to repeat the tradition as it has come to them, in rote fashion.
They are joined by many communities in the
This search for the new takes place against a
background of, in the case of the West, a theology whose purpose was primarily
to gain `sure knowledge' or scientia. The
domain of such theology is the culture of towns and cities disciplined by
strong legal codes and marked by rigorous intellectual traditions. Theology
was something that was reasoned and taught by specialists. It was strong
enough to flourish where worldviews competed with one another. It contrasted
markedly with the earlier, wisdom theology, sapientia,
and spirituality, of the monastery and the rural world. The 1960's were
marked by needs for major social changes. This gave rise to local theologies
of praxis, which sought to bring about change in dominant social patterns. A
further type is the theology that is variation or expansion of a sacred text
by means of sermons, commentaries and anthologies.
Schreiter goes into much specialist detail on how local
theologians can learn to interact with local cultures, in order to listen to
the culture and in order to speak to it. All that can be done here is to note
that there is such a practical activity as local or contextual theology which
can be carried out in locations such as Chelmsford and Tasmania, or in
relation to built environment as a sector of life, or possibly in relation to
both, taking into full consideration what happens when typologies are used and
embodied values interpreted.
12.7
Nehemiah
In the context of this Section, Nehemiah is a quite
narrow text. One structure dominates, the city wall of
A significant cross section of the built world is here.
12.11
Synthesis and centripetal dynamic
In terms of infrastructure,
From another age, the text of Nehemiah takes us into
the palace and streets of
The centripetal force is at work when it demands that
local theologies be done asking what these arrays of buildings not only say
but also do. The true answers to those questions can be revealed or hidden by
such matters as the categories and typologies with which one chooses to work.
The most generic questions for any theological or other
ethical consideration are those posed by King:
Whose
ideas,
Whose
beliefs,
Whose
values or
Whose
view of the world
are being considered
here?
In relation to King Edward's Grammar School, Tuckwell
starts to answer such questions when he notes one of his predecessors as
Headmaster insisting that the school belonged to neither him nor the Governors
but to the parents. Today, perhaps, we would put the students first.