Ivor Cunningham; Landscape architect
Hyfler/Rosner
March 29, 2007, Thursday
Ivor Cunningham, landscape architect, was born in May 15,
1928. He died of cancer on March 15, 2007, aged 78
Landscape architect whose attractive housing developments
encouraged community by linking private and public spaces
Few postwar housing projects have aroused enormous affection
in their residents.
Those built by Span Developments around London and the South
East are an exception, and one of main reasons for this was
the attractive and sensitive landscaping by Ivor Cunningham.
Span had been set up in 1948 by the developers Geoffrey
Townsend and Leslie Bilsby, with Eric Lyons as consultant
architect. Cunningham joined them in 1955 as Span began to
develop a distinctive style, which combined the rational
discipline of modernism with an appreciation of how ordinary
families actually wanted to live.
The name reflected this desire "to span the gap between the
suburban monotony of the typical speculative development and
the architecturally designed, individually built residence
that has become (for all but a few) financially
unattainable", as the company put it in the 1960s.
Cunningham's landscaping was a central part of the vision.
After he became a partner of Lyons's practice in 1962,
Cunningham and Lyons designed projects jointly, working at
the same drawing board, conceiving houses and their setting
as a single entity. The aim was to link private to public
spaces, providing the garages and gardens that residents
wanted without letting them squeeze out communal areas.
"The spaces in between the buildings are not left to chance,
and this integrated design process leads to a cohesive
outcome where the buildings help create the settings and the
settings enhance the buildings," Lyons and Cunningham
explained.
It was these spaces between buildings that made Span
developments work. Indoor merged smoothly into outdoor,
allowing children to play outside and residents to meet each
other, encouraging informal social contact and discouraging
crime.
Unusually among large housing projects, Span estates created
a sense of ownership and pride that extended beyond
residents' own front doors. "You are sensitised to the
changing seasons because the houses were designed to give
uninterrupted views.
Every day you appreciate what they did," says Patrick
Ellard, who has lived in Span's New Ash Green, Kent, since
1969.
Lyons insisted on strong residents' associations, both to
maintain the estates and to foster a sense of community.
Residents are often fiercely devoted to Span developments,
and many have lived in them from the start, refusing to
consider moving anywhere else.
Cunningham took great care to adapt his designs to the
existing features of the Span sites. In particular, he went
to great lengths to retain mature trees, giving developments
a sense of individuality and continuity. At Templemere in
Weybridge, Surrey, the housing was designed around a row of
18th-century cedars of Lebanon, using octagonal pavilions
and flowing lines instead of rectangular courts. The
sympathetic landscaping helped the project to win a Housing
Medal and a Civic Trust Award.
Ivor Cunningham was born in Bromley in 1928. He attended
Dartford Grammar and Medway School of Art, then went to the
Architectural Association, qualifying in 1951. He did
postgraduate work on landscaping at Durham University and in
the Netherlands. He designed for the landscape architects
Sylvia Crowe and Brenda Colvin, then Eric Anjou in
Stockholm. While he was still in Sweden, Lyons offered him a
job. He was to stay in the practice for nearly 50 years.
Most of their projects were in leafy suburban areas such as
Twickenham, Weybridge and Blackheath. They also built an
ambitious scheme at Highsett in Cambridge.
World's End in Chelsea was an exceptional large-scale
project, including seven high-rise towers.
In 1969 the Greater London Council withdrew its support from
Span's 2,000 house project, New Ash Green, plunging the
company into financial turmoil. The project was taken over
by Bovis, and Span collapsed. But Lyons and Cunningham
continued to design, and in 1976 the original team reformed
as Span Environments, whose projects included Corner Keep in
Blackheath.
Lyons died in 1980, but Cunningham oversaw the completion in
1984 of the last Span project, Mallard Place, in Twickenham.
This won a Housing Design Award in 2005.
After this he continued to design for the Eric Lyons
Cunningham Metcalfe practice until retirement in 2003. He
devoted his last years to ensuring that the legacy of Span,
an effort that culminated last year in an RIBA exhibition
and accompanying book, Eric Lyons and Span. Their
achievements serve as a model for creating sustainable
housing projects today.
He is survived by his wife Annabel and four children.