The Concise Townscape

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Cullen lived in the small village of Wraysbury (Berkshire) from 1958 until his death, aged 80, on 11 August 1994, following a serious stroke. After his passing, David Gosling and Norman Foster collected various examples of his work and put them together in the book "Visions of Urban Design". The last example, and the mosthomely, shows the exterior decoratorat work. The tree has been placed inthe village centre in just the sameway that a bowl of flowers is placedon the living-room table, and for thesame reason, because it is green andfresh and a foil to the permanentstructure. The book’s title is ‘The Concise Townscape,’ and Gordon Cullen is the author. He was a well-known urban planner and architect from England who played a significant role in the townscape movement. Cullen introduced a novel theory and approach to urban visual analysis and design founded on the psychology of perception, including human perceptions of time and space and the need for visual stimulation. The Concise Townscape is the name given to later versions of Townscape. Through this book, he significantly contributed to the Townscape’s structure.

Concerning OPTICS. Let us suppose that we are walking through atown: here is a straight road off which is a courtyard, at the far side ofwhich another street leads out and bends slightly before reaching amonument. Not very unusual. We take this path and our first view isthat of the street. Upon turning into the courtyard the new view isrevealed instantaneously at the point of turning, and this view remainswith us whilst we walk across the courtyard. Leaving the courtyard weenter the further street. Again a new view is suddenly revealed althoughwe are travelling at a uniform speed. Finally as the road bends themonument swings into view. The significance of all this is that althoughthe pedestrian walks through the town at a uniform speed, the scenery oftowns is often revealed in a series of jerks or revelations. This we callSERIAL VISION. Manchester Square sums up thewhole character and quality of urbanlife, proportion, elegance, highdensity and the foil of a lush collec­tive garden. How to explain? Example: the nearest to hand at the time of writing isSees cathedral near Alen'Y0n,p.I4. The Gothic builders were fascinated bythe problem of weight, how to support the culmination of their structures,the vault, and guide its weight safely down to earth. In this buildingweight has been divided into two parts. The walls are supported bysturdy cylindrical columns: the vault itself, the pride of the endeavour,appears to be supported on fantastically attenuated applied columnswhich act almost as lightning conductors .of gravity between heaven andthe solid earth. The walls are held up by man, the vault is clearly heldup by angels. 'I understand weight, I am strong', 'I have overcomeweight, I am ethereal'. 'We both spring from the same earth together, weneed each other'. Through the centuries they commune together inserenity.Cullen was born in Calverley, Pudsey, near Leeds, Yorkshire, England. He studied architecture at the Royal Polytechnic Institution, the present day University of Westminster, and subsequently worked as a draughtsman in various architects' offices including that of Berthold Lubetkin and Tecton, but he never qualified or practised as an architect. The enclave or interior open to theexterior and having free and directaccess from one to the other is seen All that remains is to join them together into a new pattern created bythe warmth and power and vitality of human imagination so that webuild the home of man.

Thomas Gordon Cullen was born in Otley, Yorkshire on the 9th August 1914, the son of a Methodist minister. He studied architecture and draughtsmanship at the Regent Street Polytechnic in London and subsequently worked as a draughtsman in various architects’ offices including that of Berthold Lubetkin and Tecton, but he never qualified or practised as an architect. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval systemor transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying,recording or otherwise without the prior written permission of the publisher And yet ... if at the end of it all the city appears dull, uninterestingand soulless, then it is not fulfilling itself. It has failed. The fire has beenlaid but nobody has put a match to it. Up to now we have emphasized thecategories and moods of the environ­ment, the quality of thisness. Thenext phase is to bring together Thisand That to find out what emotionsand dramatic situations can beliberated out of the various forms ofrelationship. The first example,illusion, is based on the bluff thatThis is That. We know that it is inthe nature of water to be level inrepose and yet, by cunningly rampingthe retaining walls of the pool, re­taining walls which, as everyoneknows are always level, the illusion iscreated that the water is sloping.Levelness is sloping, This is That.In this shortened version, the studies of specific towns have been left outand instead Cullen has contributed a new foreword and conclusion which His techniques consisted largely of sketchy drawings that conveyed a particularly clear understanding of his ideas, and these had a considerable influence on subsequent architectural illustration styles. He also illustrated several books by other various authors, before writing his own book - based on the idea of Townscape - in 1961. The Concise Townscape has subsequently been republished around 15 times, proving to be one of the most popular books on Urban Design in the 20th Century. The once essential distinction between town and country has long since collapsed into an endless stream of images that not only mediates our perception but materially transforms the environment into a virtually continuous system that admits no distinctions or limits. Gordon Cullen played an essential role in this reconfiguration of our postmodern worldspace by developing a graphic vocabulary elements of which are now so ubiquitous as to go unnoticed in our saturated visual field. Engler’s important study reveals that by redrawing the obvious, the author of Townscape had an impact far greater than the limits of any town or country. In a town, a lived-in place, the lay­out of the spaces in which the publicmoves is a matter having a directimpact on the emotions, as hasalready been noted. To rationalizeall these spaces into streets, andworse, a gridiron of streets, seems todeny the nature of people and extola system which is fundamentallyillogical because it is not derivedfrom the character towns are knownto possess. The typical town is not apattern of streets but a scquC/lce of The process of linking and joiningtogether raises the problem thatalthough it may be visually rewardin,to link here and there, it may notsuit the immediate purposes of thosewho are charged with the COntrolofthe place to allow people or cattle tomove about at will. Hence the use ofhazards. Our diagram shows fourkinds of hazards, the railing, water,planting and change of level. Allthese permit visual access whilstdenying physical access. Perhaps themost well-known hazard is the ha-haor concealed ditch which, from theviewing point of the squire's windo\\does not interrupt the green sweepof the landscape but excludes cattlefrom the home gardens. Below is anexample from the Festival of Britain,showing how water is used to per­suade people to pay for what they eat