Manchester Modern

Richard Brook’s unparalleled guide to twentieth-century architecture in Manchester published in softback.In “manchester MODERN” Brook presents 111 buildings of the twentieth and early twenty-first century. The book is conceived as a field guide, small enough to fit in your pocket, but weighty enough to know its merit. The book’s designer, Vaseem Bhatti, is an artist of pedigree who defined the distinctive visual identity of Warp Records, Lex Records, and Manchester’s Skam Records. Brook has built a reputation in academic circles and amongst aficionados as a passionate and informed expert in the architecture of the region and of the provinces. In “manchester MODERN,” he presents 111 buildings, lovingly photographed and researched over twenty years. Vaseem is an artist of pedigree who defined the distinctive visual identity of Warp Records’ hip-hop offshoot, Lex Records, as well as being instrumental in the definition of Manchester’s Skam Records and their aesthetic presence in virtual and printed media. He founded EHQuestionmark and has worked with Richard in one form or another for the best part of fifteen years. This coming together of academic and artist has been made possible by the Modernist Society, and we are proud to be able to aid Richard and Vaseem in finally delivering a softback edition of this publication, which is long overdue. Luxuriously printed by Graphicom, the book design features orange stitching, silver foiling and a few hidden secrets.

About the Author :
Professor Richard Brook is Professor in Architecture at the University of Lancaster. "I am a registered Architect and an architectural historian. I am especially interested in the ways in which policy and legislation govern space and affect design. This approach characterises my research that is primarily focussed on post-war history and the relationships of the built environment with the structures of the state. I have studied official architecture, infrastructure, landscape and mainstream modernism, all with a focus on how these can narrate wider social, cultural, economic and political histories. I am an advisor to the Modernist Society, a member of the Twentieth Century Society’s Casework Committee and an active member of the Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain, the European Architectural History Network, DoCoMoMo UK and the Architectural Humanities Research Association. My research generally concerns the post-war period (1945-1980) and is largely focussed on British architecture, landscape and urbanism. One area of particular focus are the renewal cities of the UK – those that undertook the majority of their reconstruction after 1959 – they are complex places where burgeoning planning legislation and municipally sponsored urban design met with commercial investment and rising consumerism. Buildings in these settings typically manifested as mainstream modernism and, until recently, were viewed as derivative and not always worthy of study. I have contributed to the development of scholarly work that recognises the value of provincial cities and their architecture in terms of what it has to say about the rest of society. My funded research has explored the digital preservation of buildings and I am interested in how new technologies can enrich and activate archive holdings and have worked extensively with archivists to open up collections through my work. Most recently, I have been working on the landscapes of post-war infrastructure, in an attempt to recover lost design knowledge and to understand the various roles of design professionals within an ostensibly engineering realm. The ways in which infrastructure met with society and its networks in an era of nationalisation and powerful state interventions in the built environment is an area of particular concern. I have an enduring fascination with the entire project of modernising Britain after 1945 with special attention on provincial and regional settings that can be overlooked in architectural history." Vaseem Bhatti, born in Glasgow, is of Indian/Pakistani descent and currently lives and works  in both Manchester and Cornwall. Also working under the pseudonyms of EHQuestionmark  and Bhatoptics, he has an object-specific, concept- and process-driven practice with a non medium-specific approach which attempts to deal with notions of facades and surface;  questions of material truth, fetishism and hierarchies; and the testing of doctrines of  functionality and taste. Commissions include work for artists (Lara Favaretto, Jake & Dinos  Chapman, Banksy, Futurefarmers, Agnes Mayer-Brandis, Etoy), musicians (MF Doom, Gruf  Rhys, Danger Mouse, 808 State, Demdike Stare, Autechre, and Matthew Herbert), and  organisations (The Modernists Society, Warp Records, Lex Records, and Pentagram).