0:00:02 > 0:00:06BBCFour Collections - archive programmes chosen by experts.
0:00:06 > 0:00:09For this collection, Janet Street-Porter has selected
0:00:09 > 0:00:12programmes about post-war architecture.
0:00:12 > 0:00:15More programmes on this theme and other BBC Four Collections
0:00:15 > 0:00:17are available on BBC iPlayer.
0:00:38 > 0:00:40WHIRRING
0:00:43 > 0:00:44Thisis the view from my window.
0:00:44 > 0:00:48Classic picture postcard stuff, capital city.
0:00:48 > 0:00:51It makes me angry to see what they've done with it.
0:00:51 > 0:00:54In a timid gestureto preserve the view of St Paul's
0:00:54 > 0:00:57we get a dismembered dome on a base of spec-built offices.
0:00:57 > 0:01:00So much for sensitive low-rise development.
0:01:00 > 0:01:04I always think, if someone had had the nerve to turn all those buildings
0:01:04 > 0:01:08on their side, and make adecent tower...
0:01:12 > 0:01:17THIS is a tower, andno-one could call Trellick Tower a timid building.
0:01:24 > 0:01:25Trellick Tower is bold
0:01:25 > 0:01:28because it confronts issues about living in the modern city.
0:01:28 > 0:01:32It's a building with strong ideas and determined to hold its own.
0:01:32 > 0:01:35You can tell that it won't becompromised.
0:02:11 > 0:02:15Thearchitect, Erno Goldfinger, was a committed modernist.
0:02:15 > 0:02:17He understood the city.
0:02:17 > 0:02:20He understood that the infrastructure of roads and rail
0:02:20 > 0:02:22are as much a part of the city asits people.
0:02:23 > 0:02:27He understood its density. And he built an urban building.
0:02:41 > 0:02:44The tower block was a positive response tothe city,
0:02:44 > 0:02:48to rise above the pollution and noise and to free more of the available
0:02:48 > 0:02:51land for open space, for parks and pedestrians.
0:02:52 > 0:02:56This is the point that you always seem toget interrupted by,
0:02:56 > 0:02:59"Yeah, but what about people with kids?"
0:02:59 > 0:03:01Well, I understand that the British are firmly rootedto the earth
0:03:02 > 0:03:04and can entertain the notion that children need a garden.
0:03:05 > 0:03:07But why can't you have roots inthe sky?
0:03:07 > 0:03:11I grew up on the 23rd floor of a New York apartment building
0:03:11 > 0:03:13and, OK, so I didn't watch too many flowers grow,
0:03:13 > 0:03:16but I used to see the Queen Mary come into port.
0:03:16 > 0:03:19Is my understanding of the universe any less forthe experience?
0:03:22 > 0:03:26The primary Corbusian justification for high-rise living,to provide sun,
0:03:26 > 0:03:32space and greenery, is handled both monumentally and sensitively.
0:03:32 > 0:03:35The lift toweris detached from the building but connected by bridges
0:03:35 > 0:03:39at every third floor and crowned by the boiler room.
0:03:39 > 0:03:42This physically isolates the noisy services like lift, heating
0:03:42 > 0:03:45and rubbish collection from the flats.
0:03:46 > 0:03:48It's definitely very dramatic.
0:03:48 > 0:03:50At one pointyou're enclosed in
0:03:50 > 0:03:52a stainless steel box in a concrete shaft,
0:03:52 > 0:03:56and then the next moment you virtually explode into
0:03:56 > 0:03:59the natural light of the corridors and bridges.
0:04:07 > 0:04:10Theflats are more like houses in the air.
0:04:10 > 0:04:14You come off the high-rise street into a spacious hall with stairs.
0:04:14 > 0:04:18No sign of a corridor, which you might have expected.
0:04:18 > 0:04:20You immediately notice the light flooding in from
0:04:20 > 0:04:24both sides of the flat. It really is remarkably bright.
0:04:24 > 0:04:27This is partly because we're so high up,
0:04:27 > 0:04:29and also because of Goldfinger's inspired plan.
0:04:46 > 0:04:48And this is a clever detail.
0:04:48 > 0:04:51Light switches incorporated into the steel door frame.
0:04:51 > 0:04:53Mark of a man who obviously loved design.
0:04:55 > 0:04:57And again, that view.
0:04:57 > 0:05:00We're on the 21st floor now and the scale becomesmore intimate.
0:05:00 > 0:05:03You feel closer to people on the streets,
0:05:03 > 0:05:06but unlike a ground-level house, there's no need for curtains.
0:05:06 > 0:05:07They can't see you.
0:05:07 > 0:05:11Well, no Queen Mary, but we do have the Royal Horse Artillery.
0:05:14 > 0:05:16Look at this almost rustic feature.
0:05:17 > 0:05:20You can open the top of the stable doorsin the kitchen, watch
0:05:20 > 0:05:22thechildren playing on the balcony
0:05:22 > 0:05:24at the same time you're cooking dinner.
0:05:24 > 0:05:28I'm suresome parents are gasping in horror at the thought of it.
0:05:30 > 0:05:33One thing Goldfinger didn't want to see on the balconies waswashing.
0:05:33 > 0:05:36He was a modernist, after all, and to pre-empt this insult,
0:05:36 > 0:05:39three launderettes were located inthe lift tower.
0:05:39 > 0:05:42These were some of a range of communal facilities
0:05:42 > 0:05:43offered on the site.
0:05:43 > 0:05:47Others included a club room,nursery school and a doctor's surgery.
0:06:00 > 0:06:02This used to be a launderette.
0:06:02 > 0:06:06Launderettes,for instance, make good community centres, places to chat
0:06:06 > 0:06:08while you wait for a drier.
0:06:08 > 0:06:11I remember coming here years ago to a going-away party given bysome
0:06:11 > 0:06:13friends who lived in the flats.
0:06:13 > 0:06:17There were oysters and champagne lying on crushed ice on the driers.
0:06:17 > 0:06:20Never would have happened at Dot Cotton's.
0:06:20 > 0:06:22The place has been closed for some years now.
0:06:22 > 0:06:24They had problems with vandals.
0:06:27 > 0:06:30Trellick Tower has not been immune from problems.
0:06:30 > 0:06:34You can choose your villain - the architect, the people who live here,
0:06:34 > 0:06:38the management. But I think it's a problem of interpretation.
0:06:39 > 0:06:41The tower block has become the metaphor
0:06:41 > 0:06:42for the ills of modern society
0:06:42 > 0:06:44and the hazards of urban living.
0:06:44 > 0:06:47It's too easy to put in some ominous clouds
0:06:47 > 0:06:49to paint shadows on every landing.
0:07:07 > 0:07:11And yet the same idea, the tower block,can be portrayed romantically.
0:07:28 > 0:07:32But I think that the real threat has been an inability toaccept urbanism.
0:07:32 > 0:07:35You have to be bold and believe to make it work.
0:07:45 > 0:07:47From here, on one of the pulpit balconies,
0:07:47 > 0:07:50I can appropriate a bit of the city.
0:07:50 > 0:07:53And yet, as an individual, I know I'm part of something much larger.
0:07:53 > 0:07:58I can celebrate the mass of humanity, even in concrete.
0:08:30 > 0:08:33It isn't easy living in a city.
0:08:33 > 0:08:36It's a difficult leapfrom an individual - one -
0:08:36 > 0:08:40to be one in ten million. It's all about finding one's place.
0:08:40 > 0:08:42I think Trellick Tower is a great building
0:08:43 > 0:08:46becauseit has a clear idea of its place in the city, its roots,
0:08:46 > 0:08:49and a vision of how we might live there.
0:08:49 > 0:08:52Then it's up to us as individuals.
0:08:52 > 0:08:57It's not an easy building, but then, who says architecture should be easy?