Well that was quick… my Brutal Bristol photo walk has already sold out, as has Elliot’s tour on Saturday. It seems like people can’t get enough of brutalism in Bristol. Another event will be announced soon… the-modernist.org/products/bri...

I love it when a car park proudly declares what it is in concrete. St Clement Street Car Park, Truro, Cornwall.

“I imagine our current situation will cause future generations to shudder at the thoughtlessness in the way in which we today fill our homes, our cities and our landscape with a chaos of assorted junk.” Dieter Rams, who has just been awarded the World Design Medal. www.vitsoe.com/gb/voice/wdo

As part of our BRUTAL Bristol exhibition, you can join @eberlin.co.uk on a walk around Bristol photographing some of its best buildings. Sign up here: the-modernist.org/products/bri...

Thank you @bristol247.bsky.social for covering our upcoming BRUTAL Bristol exhibition at Sparks (the old M&S in Broadmead) on 8-12 October. And thank you @raynewman.bsky.social for your wordsmithery. www.bristol247.com/news-and-fea...

Lordy if I were within a hundred miles of this you better believe I'd be taking part. BUT MAYBE YOU CAN!

As part of our BRUTAL Bristol exhibition, you are invited to come on a stroll around some brutiful Bristol buildings on 12th October. You can reserve your place here: the-modernist.org/products/bri...

So many good things to see in London this autumn - especially this exhibition.

In the early 80s, Paul Graham published a trilogy of photobooks which portray how people experienced economic changes, bureaucratic indifference and sectarian violence during a period of profound social change. open.substack.com/pub/eberlin/...

Chris Steel-Perkins, who died this week, and his images that defined an era. www.theguardian.com/artanddesign...

A mob of angry drunken men screaming abuse outside an asylum hotel have defended their actions, saying all they want is for women and girls to feel safe walking the streets. From the new Private Eye, out now.

Redcliffe, Bristol More on the exhibition with the Bristol Modernist Society 👇 the-modernist.org/blogs/news/b...

Sorry, I meant to link to this programme (I haven't watched the one I first linked to yet - but I will). www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/epis...

This was aired on BBC4 last night and I enjoyed it. I know Martin Parr isn’t everyone’s cup of English tea, but I like his approach and his photos and thank him for all he is doing for British documentary photography via his excellent Foundation. www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/epis...

Bumpity bump bump

“Its significance at the time was in showing that a modern scheme could be as elegant and obsessively crafted as anything Georgian... a bespoke product by Denmark’s answer to Robert Adam, with the design extending right down to the cutlery.” Owen Hatherley St Catherine’s College, Arne Jacobsen

Playing around.

Be confident that a new age of Enlightenment is possible The principles that opened the door to modernity were great in 1784 and remain great in 2025.

Coming soon… “thoughtstream capitalism” observer.co.uk/news/science...

“We’ve seen this all before; the grim ‘chainification’ of places that started out as sparky indies and have been sucked, by the virtue of their success, into the deadening maw of capitalism.” observer.co.uk/news/opinion...

I like visiting art galleries and I like modern buildings so I’m fascinated to see how modern architecture has attached itself to a mid-20th century power station (now Tate Modern), the 19th century Tate Britain and an 18th century hotel (now The Holburne Museum). open.substack.com/pub/eberlin/...

In this month's Jotter: 1. Quietly contemplate the impermanence of civilisations... 2. Analogue stories. 3. Katy Cowan of @creativeboom.com, shares some lessons. 4. Grätzloasen. 5. Buycott... 6. The story behind a pitch-perfect lament. 7. Work www.brighterside.co.uk/news/monthly...

BRUTAL Bristol 8-12 October 2025 at Sparks (the old M&S). A collaborative exhibition celebrating the city’s oft-forgotten brutalist architecture through photography, illustrations, publications, and more. www.eberlin.co.uk/brutal-brist...

There’s some nice looking petrol stations here: www.theguardian.com/artanddesign...

Successful foraging for this evening’s crumble.

“… no LLM is ever going to morph into a truly superintelligent agent because intelligence isn’t actually in its DNA.” @jjn1.bsky.social again explains why there’s no intelligence in Chat GPT etc observer.co.uk/news/columni...

A modern day dreaming spire. Said Business School welcomes you as you emerge from Oxford railway station. Designed by Dixon Jones and opened on 2001.

Nostalgia for the holiday ritual of being the first to shout "I see the sea."

Here's some good news:

Gradel Quadrangle, New College, Oxford. If only more student accommodation was as unusual and original as this, instead of the bland towers cropping up across Bristol and elsewhere.

Very good news

Sunday is even better when I read a glowing review of a client’s work in The Observer. George Harding is exhibiting at the @bethlemmuseum.bsky.social until 22nd November.

If you like Radiohead and you like art, you will like THIS IS WHAT YOU GET @ashmoleanmuseum.bsky.social www.ashmolean.org/exhibition/t...

My Week: JD Vance* www.thetimes.com/article/f3df...

Sorry, but if you call my password weak I'm not going to tell you where the traffic lights are

There are few modernist buildings of distinction in Bath and it’s a rare example of a female architect designing any building, never mind this prominent building, in the pre-war area. So it’s a shame that this one is scheduled for demolition later this year. www.eberlin.co.uk/buildings/ba...

I've never warmed to SouthGate (with thanks to @westcountrymodern.bsky.social for the link). "But SouthGate's biggest crime, perhaps, is that it gets wrong what the rest of Bath gets so beautifully right: proportion. It's just too big. It can't fit in." www.theguardian.com/artanddesign...

This is a damn fine book. It even appeared in my hallowed best photobooks list of 2022 with the following quotation from Tim: “… this book is about waste: wasted land, wasted lives and the waste of consumerism… using a resource that is itself going to waste (expired photographic film).”

It's one of the most moving and evocative songs I have listened to. “If something is boring after two minutes, try it for four,” composer John Cage once said of Zen Buddhism. “If still boring, try it for eight, 16… Eventually one discovers that it’s not boring at all but very interesting.”

Ibis Hotel, Portsmouth. A prefab capsule hotel designed by Pierre-Yves Cochion in the late 1970s... with porthole windows acknowledging Portsmouth's naval history.

I'm inclined to agree. Delicious purchases from the farm shop are providing my lunch for yesterday and today. Which begs the question, why aren't more services like Gloucester (and Tebay)?

What a good idea.

IT'S HAPPENING FOLKS! My Valleys book is being printed! Design by @seanrees.bsky.social Print by WithPrint Paper by GF Smith And a few photos by me! Can't to get these in the post to you all!

Enough brutalism, let’s have some Palladian. A very nice, sunny day in Derbyshire’s Peak District. Here’s Chatsworth. We are pleased to say our offer has been accepted and we hope to exchange late September. Assuming the survey is ok, of course.

Very important and essential Bradford on Avon news. The Flower and Produce show is on a Saturday (6th Sept) and a different venue this year (Holy Trinity Church). www.wiltshiretimes.co.uk/news/2537090...

This makes me look forward even more to an evening in Cardiff with @neilcoxon.bsky.social next year.

Photos of buildings while spending a day in Portsmouth with jolly good fellow, @stefanpowell.bsky.social www.eberlin.co.uk/buildings/po...

The kind of art I like by Kate Jackson. She was in The Long Blondes who made damn fine music just shy of 20 years ago. How time flies. www.theguardian.com/artanddesign...

A brutalist masterpiece on the south coast... Norrish Library in Porstmouth.