Category Archives: Practice

One site, three buildings

First building: Near left column Second building: Main enveloping structure Third building: New frame for lift and floor

Posted in CiA, Dominic Roberts, Practice | Comments Off on One site, three buildings

Interview with Alvaro Siza

Alvaro Siza – Quinta da Malagueira, Évora, Portugal (1977) An edited extract from an interview conducted by Manchester School of Architecture doctoral candidate António Oliviera with the 2009 Royal Gold Medallist Alvaro Siza Vieira AO: What were the principles underlying … Continue reading

Posted in Alvaro Siza, Aventinus, CiA, Friends & Acquaintances, Portugal, Practice, Research | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments

“The Architect’s Task”

Two drawings of the Woodside Ventilation Station for the Queensway tunnel beneath the River Mersey. The drawings are from a battered copy of The Story of the Mersey Tunnel Officially Named Queensway published by Charles Birchall and Sons (1934). Excerpt: … Continue reading

Posted in CiA, Dominic Roberts, Practice | Tagged , , , , , | Comments Off on “The Architect’s Task”

Valley roll

New stepped valley constructed in timber and according with best practice. Ready for lining. With the tapered gutter, the pitched roof merges into the sole of the gutter without upstands. Thus, according to the fall of the gutter and the … Continue reading

Posted in Architecture Hacks, CiA, Dominic Roberts, Practice | 1 Comment

When breathed upon or otherwise rendered moist

Two hundred year old roof, Lake District UK. Lead dowel used to fix slates to battens. It is more usual to find timber dowels or iron nails. Westmorland slates reclaimed from the roof. Slates are tested for quality by their … Continue reading

Posted in Architecture Hacks, CiA, Dominic Roberts, Practice | Comments Off on When breathed upon or otherwise rendered moist

Uncovering a roof

A two hundred-year old roof, Lake District, UK. Nothing much to say – sometimes you are presented with the facts. How complicated can a simple roof be? Main structure of king-post trusses and tie beams. Plaster and lath ceiling. Spindly … Continue reading

Posted in CiA, Dominic Roberts, Practice | 2 Comments

City to the left, staircase to the right

Illustration from Hans Vredeman de Vries : Pictores, Statvarii, Architecti, Latomi, Et Qvicvnqve Principvm Magnificorvmq[ue] Virorvm Memoriæ Æternæ Inservitis….link to e-book at the University of Heidelberg See also: Science and Art; True Science or Science Fiction? #1: Tinguely, Oliver Byrne, … Continue reading

Posted in CiA, Dominic Roberts, Practice | Comments Off on City to the left, staircase to the right

The great gates of Preston

Original detailed drawing of the gates to the Harris Museum, Preston 1882-1893. “The architect was the widely unknown James Hibbert”*. Compare the repeated star/sun motif with this house. More pictures of the building… * N. Pevsner in “The Buildings of … Continue reading

Posted in CiA, Dominic Roberts, Practice, Preston | Comments Off on The great gates of Preston

From the hillside

Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR. Summer Hill near Ulverston in Cumbria in changing light, November 2007. The house is an extension and reuse of one side of a small Georgian country house. Phase 2 of the project will see the conversion … Continue reading

Posted in CiA, Practice, Sally Stone | Tagged , , , | Comments Off on From the hillside

Continuity loves Comper

A recent biography of Sir Ninian Comper reasseses the career and reputation of this prolific church architect. The book ‘Sir Ninian Comper’ by Anthony Symondson and Stephen Bucknall is published by Spire Books, and you can read a review (from … Continue reading

Posted in Aventinus, Churches, CiA, Practice | Comments Off on Continuity loves Comper

A Small Building

An addition to a Victorian gate lodge north of Preston, Lancashire by Dominic Roberts of CiA and Francis Roberts Architects.

Posted in CiA, Practice, Preston, Sally Stone | 1 Comment

Outram on London

We have added John Outram Associates to our links. “…Looked at today, 3 years after our ‘retirement’ from Battersea in Christmas 1997 – London is looking increasingly like a funfair anyway. The monument to the non-architecture of suburban Bungalow-Culture that … Continue reading

Posted in CiA, Dominic Roberts, Practice | Comments Off on Outram on London