Last time Quinlan Terry cropped up here (Palladio in the Park) I called him Terry Quinlan until a better informed reader in Dublin put me right. (Thank you, Margaret.) As far as I can remember he got quite a good write-up from me for his Palladian villas in Regent’s Park. Today he is going to get a good kicking.
Prince Charles’s favourite project is to show architects the error of their ways. Those nasty carbuncles, walkie-talkies, cheese graters and ink wells (his name for the gherkin) get up his nose. However, to give him credit, he decided to show what he thinks good architecture can look like and has used a bit of his Duchy of Cornwall land to build a new town in Dorset, Poundbury. A new square has just been built there with this block of flats on one side. It has been dubbed Buckingham Palace by the BBC but the developer explains that all Q Terry buildings look like this.
In fact it more closely resembles continental palaces such as in Copenhagen.
What’s not to like about living in a flat in such a grandiose pile? Personally I’m not keen to de-camp to Poundbury but if you feel drawn Dorset-wards take a look at the interior. It amazes me that a 21st century block of flats can be so poorly designed. Here is a video tour.
https://youtu.be/OgGi2KqsFe8
The interior, or at least the one in the video, is badly laid out, badly designed and with scant attention to detail. Where to start? How about with the small bedroom that has a balcony. That would be ideal as a study/sitting room where the balcony doors could be left open. How about the sitting room in which the dining table is placed by the windows but as far as possible from the kitchen. In the reign of Queen Victoria kitchens in big houses were often placed far from the dining room but then there was staff to do the fetching and carrying. The chandeliers? Many too many of them and they will obscure the pictures, although in the show flat filmed that’s a plus. One of the bathrooms doesn’t even have a shelf over the basin. The kitchen – good grief – all those hideous cupboards stuck on the walls. What a gimcrack effort that betrays its noble exterior, it’s patron’s intention and the Queen Mother after whom it is named.