令人感動的校園設計。坦白說，絕大部分比我的英國母校更好
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“Masterpiece” of Brutalism. Essex 2014 University of Essex
“Masterpiece” of Brutalism is being celebrated with new exhibition at our Colchester Campus. Check out our "Something fierce" exhibition located in the Hexagon. ^Luiza
07 October 2014
“Masterpiece” of Brutalism celebrated with new exhibition
As the rediscovery and reevaluation of Brutalism in the UK continues to gather pace, the University of Essex officially opens an exhibition this week devoted to its iconic Colchester Campus – described by the co-curator Professor Jules Lubbock as a “masterpiece” of 1960s design.
The show titled Something Fierce: University of Essex – Vision and Reality opens as the National Trust launches tours of the 27-storey Balfron Tower, a 1960s concrete tower block in east London, designed by architect and designer Erno Goldfinger.
Professor Lubbock, an expert on architecture and urbanism alongside the Italian Renaissance, has fought for years for recognition for the Colchester Campus designed by Kenneth Capon from Architects' Co-Partnership.
Thousands still live and work at the Colchester Campus with some not realising the architectural heritage of the buildings designed at the University’s birth 50 years ago.
Professor Lubbock, who co-curated the exhibition with University Arts and Gallery Director Jessica Kenny, said: “Capon’s ferocity has been loved by some, loathed by many and blamed for years of student protest.
“By explaining the rationale of our 1960s architecture we hope to raise people’s awareness of the University’s heritage and encourage people to be proud of it.”
The title of the exhibition, designed by David Hillman, is inspired by Capon’s insistence that he wanted to avoid the English trap of "softening everything up" and "do something fierce to let them work within".
The Albert Sloman Library at night
The displays investigate how an 18th century landscaped parkland once painted by Constable and with a Jacobean mansion at its heart became the home of an ultra-modern 20th century university.
Professor Lubbock explains the ideas which inspired the University including the key figures of Lord Annan and the first Vice-Chancellor Sir Albert Sloman and how Capon carried those ideas into the masterplan and the key buildings.
Capon’s key buildings include the dramatically positioned Albert Sloman Library influenced by another Brutalist masterpiece - Kenzo Tange’s Kagawa Prefecture - and the imposing brick towers which evoke Kahn’s Philadelphia Laboratories.
The Albert Sloman Library is still influential and was included as an icon of the 20th century in the V&A exhibition British Design 1948–2012: Innovation in the Modern Age.
The exhibition is being staged in another iconic building The Hexagon, newly refurbished especially, which once graced a postage stamp due to its provocative quartz inspired design.
The Hexagon
The displays include photos, architectural drawings and even a recreation of the LEGO model built by Capon for Sloman in 1962 to explain his initial masterplan.
Other displays include examples of how the original 1960s concrete was created on site to highlight the skilled workmanship required.
A second section of The Hexagon exhibition is devoted to the life of the University over the past five decades including the student protests of the late 1960s and 1970s through to the Anti-Apartheid Movement and human rights campaigns of more recent years.
Something Fierce: University of Essex – Vision and Reality. The Hexagon, University of Essex, Colchester Campus, Tuesday 7 October – Saturday 13 December 2014, Tuesdays to Saturdays, 11am – 5 pm.
Something Fierce at the University of Essex
by Susannah
‘Something Fierce’ is an exhibition about the architecture of the University of Essex, celebrating its 50th anniversary. Kenneth Capon of Architects’ Co-Partnership wrote: ’The English love making things shaggy and softening everything up. We decided to do something fierce to let them work within.’ Capon’s ferocity has been loved by some, loathed by many and blamed for years of student protest. In 1972 John McKean devoted an issue of the Architects’ Journal to a critical analysis, subsequently employed by Vice-Chancellors and Estates Directors as license to neglect, degrade and demolish important features. A longstanding member of staff, I have tried, with scant success till now, to promote this Brutalist masterpiece, which I once dubbed ‘the counter-modernist sublime’ in the Twentieth Century Society Journal.
In 2012 the then Vice-Chancellor demolished a fine Library vestibule that we were unable to get listed despite massive support from this Society and English Heritage’s recommendation. This gem stood in the way of a library extension. But our new Vice-Chancellor, Anthony Forster, is an enthusiast for Brutalism who initiated the rehabilitation of Dunelm House by Architects’ Co-Partnership at Durham University. He asked me to curate ‘Something Fierce’, refurbishing as a venue the Hexagon Restaurant, overlaid with post-modern decoration in the 1980s and mothballed since 2000. His brief was to tell the story of Essex through its architecture.
My most surprising discovery was that Essex was intended not as a socialist seminary but as Britain’s answer to MIT. Sputnik was launched in 1957. CP Snow’s Two Cultures appeared in 1959 just as Essex was mooted. There was deep anxiety about Britain being left behind in technology. Essex was to be a campus of 20,000 recruits for the officer class of Snow’s ‘Scientific Revolution’, plus some social scientists, and a small arts faculty to humanise the geeks.
It was planned in 1962-3 by Capon and Albert Sloman, the first Vice-Chancellor. A campus for 20,000 must be big, but they wanted community. Hence the high street of five pedestrian squares forming the town centre. Teaching courtyards would be added behind the squares. Twenty-eight residential towers were to be slotted between the courtyards. You can be out of bed and into a lecture within five minutes. There are no freestanding buildings for autonomous departments. These are distributed along corridors in a continuous zig-zag around the five squares. To create a social group out of students from different subjects there are bed-sits on each floor of the towers with a communal kitchen. Essex is very compact so that everything and everybody are intimately interrelated.
The style is 1950s Brutalism. Corbusier’s La Tourette provides the low-key urban background for special buildings like the Library, based on Kenzo Tange’s Kagawa Prefecture. The Towers evoke Kahn’s Philadelphia Laboratories. The Hexagon is the shape of a quartz crystal, derived from the Twenties version of Buckminster Fuller’s Dymaxion House.
David Hillman designed ‘Something Fierce’ to showcase the Hexagon’s interior. Although we lost the Library vestibule we have regained the Hexagon – and respect for our Sixties architecture.
by Jules Lubbock
Visitor information:
‘Something Fierce: University of Essex – Vision and Reality’, The Hexagon, University of Essex, 7 October – 13 December 2014, Tuesdays to Saturdays, 11am – 5 pm.
Getting there: http://www.essex.ac.uk/about/getting_here/colchester/default.aspx
Point A on campus map
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wivenhoe_Park
Wivenhoe Park by John ConstableWivenhoe Park is a landscaped green space of more than 200 acres (81 ha) at the eastern edge of Colchester, England. It is the site of Wivenhoe House, a four-star hotel, based in an eighteenth-century Grade II listed house.[1] Wivenhoe House is also home to the Edge Hotel School, the first school of its kind in the UK and since October 2018 a department of the University of Essex.[2] Since the 1960s, Wivenhoe Park has also been home to the Colchester Campus of the University of Essex.
University of Essex
When the sun hits Wivenhoe Park, the lake sparkles, the Brutalist architecture glows, and the whole community feels alive with energy. Days like this remind us just how vibrant Essex really is.
University of Essex
Thousands of solar panels are helping to power the Colchester Campus as we continue to reduce our carbon footprint.
Around 8% of electricity used on campus each year is now being generated through solar power, according to our latest sustainability report.
2026年初，ESSEX大學因裁員關分校等，員工罷工一周。
追記2013年的相關刊物：ESSEX effect / Square / Square 22013.6.19 接到ESSEX effect 第4期
真的是三十幾年來最漂亮的校友刊物---應該是建校50周年慶
可惜網路上還沒有此期的電子檔
這期的特色之一:
8葉的Pull-out: Unofficial history (圖文並茂)
Plus: Your news (6 pages), your books (2 pages, 13books 妙的是作者都是1981-2007年的畢業生), your careers....My Essex (圖文)
本周衝擊最大的讀物是University of Essex的校友年刊: ESSEX effect / Square / Square 2--- Essex effec此期的簡要校史t : 我們對某地或某人的了解通常都僅止於表面。譬如說，校長Sir Albert Sloman (1921-2012) 的BBC 1960年Reith講座，我只在1977年聽過英文老師轉述過他首先贊成男女可同住某一樓，即沒有女生宿舍等之分別……。這回知道他去年就過世，某報的訃文提到此講座，讀者去信說全文可在BBC網站查到。
另外是我在校時不知道該校的校訓。Wikipedia 有，我好幾年前才知道。這回我想查出那三百多行的殘詩:The University's motto, Thought the harder, heart the keener, is adapted from the Anglo-Saxon poem The Battle of Maldon. 我找的古騰堡版本與此不同。妙的是，創校時就有某報批評它是斷章取義out of context，因為下一行……。我則有點同情選它的老師，因為地名Maldon還在Essex大學地Colcherster的”近鄰”。我也恍然大悟在The Life of Johnson一書中記載某回他們要從倫敦去蘇格蘭，經Colchester，Johnson博士對此城很敬佩 ，因為它有些非常慘烈的戰役。
我因為讀
*****
ESSEX effect 第1-3期
http://goo.gl/XPF9V
*****
2010.9.28
接到Essex:Effect 2010版 內容相當另校友振奮 (此校創校半世紀多 活力不減)
難到還只有1500學生 (100多國籍)
說不完的妙處 (我記的都是非主題)
譬如說人權研究中心獲女王年度獎 校長領獎 不過照相時不搶風光
董事長獲慈善業律師獎 登得很小 他說他喜歡非營利組織的創造性無政府方式.......
諾貝爾文學獎主Derek Walcott 當Essex 的詩學教授
Essex 的經濟學 政治學 和心理學被德國權威單位CHE 評為 Excellent 一校三系 英國只11所大學 (可怪的是 昔日社會學系衰亡了)
Essex:Effect is the re-launched magazine for the University’s alumni community.The alumni magazine, formerly known as Square 1, was first published over fifteen years ago with the aim of keeping former students in touch with the University.
The magazine, which is mailed to over 40,000 alumni worldwide, features news from across the University’s three campuses, alumni updates and details of forthcoming alumni events.
Make sure you received your copy by contacting the Development and Alumni Relations Office with your up to date contact details.
2009 Essex:Effect (opens as a pdf)
----2011.10.29
Essex: EFFECT 其中一文說去年某諾貝爾獎(經濟學)是校友
---2012.9.5
英國的 University Essex 今年寄來一小本 Essex: a little extra
(32開) 封面是校園照片，翻開下頁解釋說: 此時通常寄給你 Essex: Effect 雜誌 此次稍微不同…….2013春再寄給你該校友雜誌 接下來 用百字簡介”新校長” 下頁是 “創校50周年慶1964-2014 闔興來乎”
*****2005.9.28
學校的校友刊物之編輯，可不容易，因為我們熟悉的人，永遠只是極少數。另一方面，像我太太的橫濱國立大學建築系的某一組，紀律嚴明，每年都有年刊（刊名之漢字，曾看不懂，查日本的「建築大辭典」，才知道是佛寺最高處之裝飾……）。 水煙会のページ
（公開に向け準備中）
*****2005.9.28
學校的校友刊物之編輯，可不容易，因為我們熟悉的人，永遠只是極少數。另一方面，像我太太的橫濱國立大學建築系的某一組，紀律嚴明，每年都有年刊（刊名之漢字，曾看不懂，查日本的「建築大辭典」，才知道是佛寺最高處之裝飾……）。 水煙会のページ
（公開に向け準備中）
.......
我昨天心境低沉，到台大農場看「Square 1」解憂---它是英國Essex大學的校友年錄；「
我從第一期起，就收到Essex大學校友通信，昨日的，
我以前的數學（理）學院（School of Mathematical Studies 包括電腦科學、流體力學…….），現在似乎改為 School of Mathematical Science。我系以前的統計組也是世界級的，有G. Barnard等名師，美國威斯康辛大學的英國人大師G. E. P. Box和我國的刁院士等，似乎都曾到我系作客（
我們受到的face to face 的tutorials，最寶貴。我的英國光頭老師CBW，
我從網路在進Square 1，沒想到它比印刷的內容更少，真不可思議。
***** 2004.10.3
往事（一）：我在Essex從 Greene's ''End of the Affair''入門
上周收到 University of Essex 的校友刊物Square （我過去25年一直收到，真是少有的恩惠。這學校才成立40年。
不過，近幾年都不忘提醒校友在遺囑中考慮捐贈母校……）
我一向喜歡亂讀書，所以平均成績不會很出色—我也從不考慮，有天會用它們申請學校。高院長離開東海時，我去宿舍幫他整理東西，我們談到美國留學，他認為找到適意的學校比名校重要……我成功嶺的朋友中，有人去哈佛大學取得物理博士，不過我最感激香港僑生建議我考慮到英國，因為那兒學術界質量不差。
University of Essex 的學生宿舍取名近代大學者，我崇拜羅素，聽過凱恩斯，…..不過，卻被分發到R. H. Tawney Tower。記得每樓有九間房（約有四名世界各地學生），兩套廚房設備兼用餐公共空間（許多美妙往事……），對面就是著名的Wivenhoe Park 之湖：它應該是全世界喜歡藝術論述者都熟悉的，因為Gombrich名著《藝術與幻覺》的開章就是用Constanble 畫它當題材。
許多人都自己開伙，料理晚餐，經濟方便（我第一次知道，oven的法力無邊，可以料理許多大餐）。我的第一本G. Green的小說，就是看到同「門」蘇格蘭佬每次晚餐都讀得津津有味，特地向他討教。於是，我從Graham Greene's ''End of the Affair''入門….後來，我到90年代中都還在買、讀他的作品，包括他年輕時寫的某貴族之傳記。
恰巧2004年是他百歲冥誕，在網路上如BBC和紐約時報等處，有許多他的資料和專輯，真是豐富。其實，我應該找機會重讀……
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/documentaries/features/greene-centenary.shtml
http://www.nytimes.com/books/00/02/20/specials/greene.html?oref=login#news
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