A heretic’s guide to modern architecture

Antony Dale Lecture 2024

The society’s prestigious annual lecture, held in the Music Room of the Royal Pavilion, will be given by Alan Powers, leading authority on 20th century architecture and design.

Alan Powers was born into Modern Architecture with a partner in Architects’ Co-Partnership as his father and a house designed by him as a home. From instinct corroborated by external influences, he found it hard to accept the precepts of Modernism, however, and has spent the rest of his life testing them against alternative options, finding fascinating byways in the history of the past 150 years and hoping to reshape the narrative through writing, teaching and conservation activism with the Twentieth Century Society.

Alan Powers was Professor of Architecture and Cultural History at the University of Greenwich, London 1999–2012 and now teaches at the London campus of New York University and the London School of Architecture. He has written more than 20 books on architecture, art and design of the last century.

A trigger for Dr Powers’ talk was the writings of architect H S Goodhart-Rendel, who designed St Wilfred’s Church in Elm Grove and Norwich Union House in North Street.

His recorded lecture for the Regency Society, Seaside Seduction: How the moderns lost their stays, is available online.

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Tickets cost £15.00, which includes a glass of wine or soft drink in the Banqueting Room of the Royal Pavilion after the lecture. Booking is through PayPal. You can pay from a PayPal account or by card. Just choose in this link or use the QR code.