Cedric Price FRIBA (11 September 1934 – 10 August 2003) was an English architect and influential teacher and writer on architecture.
Early life and education
The son of the architect A.G. Price, who worked with
Harry Weedon,
Price was born in Stone, Staffordshire. He studied
architecture at St John's College, Cambridge, graduating in 1955, and the Architectural Association School of Architecture (AA) in
London, where he encountered and was influenced by the modernist architect and urban planner Arthur Korn.
[Melvin J. 2003. ' Obituary: Cedric Price, Hugely creative architect ahead of his time in promoting themes of lifelong learning and brownfield regeneration'. The Guardian, 15 August 2003.] From 1958 to 1964 he taught part-time at the AA and at the Council of Industrial Design. He later founded
Polyark, an architectural schools network.
Career
After graduating, Price worked briefly for
Erno Goldfinger,
Denys Lasdun, the partnership of
Maxwell Fry and
Jane Drew, and applied unsuccessfully for a post at London County Council, working briefly as a professional illustrator before starting his own practice in 1960.
He worked with
Lord Snowdon and
Frank Newby on the design of the
Snowdon Aviary at
London Zoo (1961).
He later also worked with Buckminster Fuller on the
Claverton Dome.
One of his more notable projects was the East London Fun Palaces (1961),
Having conceived the idea of using architecture and education as a way to drive economic redevelopment—notably in the north Staffordshire Stoke-on-Trent area (the 'Think-Belt' project)—he continued to contribute to planning debates. Think-Belt (1963–66) envisaged the reuse of an abandoned railway line as a roving "higher education facility", re-establishing the Potteries as a centre of science and technology. Mobile classroom, laboratory and residential modules could be moved grouped and assembled as required.
In 1969, with planner Sir Peter Hall and the editor of New Society magazine Paul Barker, he published Non-plan, a work challenging planning orthodoxy.
In 1984, Price proposed the redevelopment of London's South Bank, and foresaw the London Eye by suggesting that a giant Ferris wheel should be constructed by the River Thames.
Personal life and death
Price was the partner of the actress
Eleanor Bron. They had no children.
Price died in London, aged 68, in 2003.
Recognition
In 2002, Price was awarded the Austrian Frederick Kiesler Prize for Architecture and the Arts.
Notes
Further reading
-
Hardingham, Samantha (2016) Cedric Price Works 1952–2003: A Forward-Minded Retrospective a two-volume anthology, co-published by the Architectural Association (AA) and the Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA)
-
Bron, Eleanor and Hardingham, Samantha, eds. (2005) Annotations: v. 7: CP Retriever, Institute of International Visual Arts (INIVA), London
-
Hardingham, Samantha (2003) Cedric Price: Opera, London: John Wiley & Sons, London.
-
Hardingham, Samantha and Rattenbury, Kester, eds. (2007) Cedric Price: Potteries Thinkbelt. London: Routledge.
-
Hughes, Jonathan and Simon Sadler, eds. (2000) Non-Plan: Essays on Freedom, Participation and Change in Modern Architecture and Urbanism. Oxford: Architectural Press.
-
Herbert Muschamp (15 August 2003) "Cedric Price, Influential British Architect With Sense of Fun, Dies at 68" (obituary) The New York Times
-
Price, Cedric (1984) Cedric Price: Works II, Architectural Association; republished in 2003 as Cedric Price: The Square Book. London: Wiley-Academy, London.
-
Staff (ndg) "Cedric Price" Design Museum
-
Staff (22 August 2003) "Cedric Price, A leading light of the 'megastructure' movement whose work was guided by amusing and inspirational ideas" (obituary). The Times
External links
