James Stirling
b. Glasgow, 1926.

Internationally known, controversial and multi-faceted British architect. Stirling trained at Liverpool University (1945-50), where the syllabus was based on Beaux-Arts principles. He began work with Lyons, Israel & ELLIS in London (1953-6) and met James Gowan, with whom he worked in partnership (1956-63). They produced a small number of influential buildings, such as the low-rise flats of Ham Common (1957), whose style, derived from Le Corbusier’s later works and Peter and Alison SMITHSON, started a trend for brick used with exposed concrete. Their major building, the Engineering Faculty building at Leicester University (1959-63), won international attention for its “Constructivist” tower and bold contrasts of industrial red bricks and large areas of glazing. It was to provide the model for a similar concept at Cambridge (1964-7) and Oxford (1966-71). The former sealed Stirling’s controversial reputation and was vilified on aesthetic and utilitarian grounds. At one point it was threatened with demolition but has now been renovated. From 1963 to 1971 Stirling was in practice on his own. He is an active teacher and became well known in the USA from whence he received a number of commissions. There were also a number of quintessentially 1960s buildings such as the Olivetti Centre and some housing at Runcorn New Town. Since 1971 Stirling has been in partnership with Michael Wilford. His later work appears more formalist, influenced by the historicism of Post-Modernism. He has aligned himself increasingly with a populist, somewhat witty form of Post-Modern classicism. His Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart, is a melange of arbitrary-seeming modern construction and randomized quotation of historical elements. The design for the Mansion House scheme was more composed, but an unkind critic compared it to an art deco radio. Stirling has always been wilfully experimental, and there is little consistency in his approach or references. Perhaps because of the Beaux-Arts nature of his training he has always admitted to this essential wilful nature of his creative decisions, so that the historicity of his “late work” is no more contrived than the modernity of his former work.