Tate Modern: The Great Tate Mod Blog: » » Style Files: The warm heart of England

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It’s a cold February morning as I wander out of New Street station, and I’m greeted by the sing-song accents of the taxi drivers, the blue skies and the Rotunda. All around there’s an architectural mish-mash of the last fifty years. I think it’s beautiful. But I’m biased: this is the city where I grew up. It’s nice to be home, but I’m all too aware this city has an image problem.

Birmingham has long been a national joke, reinventing itself countless times. From the Brave New World of the Sixties, all hope and new ideas, cast in concrete for all to see; to the arrival more recently of a certain department store. You might’ve heard of it, I think they sell fridges. This is a city that’s had more makeovers than Madonna, and despite them frequently going wrong, Birmingham never gives up – after all, its motto is ‘Forward’.

If ever there was a city of design, it would be Birmingham. With each incarnation the city fathers have tried to wipe the slate clean. And each time, as well as disasters, things of real beauty have come out of it.

Concrete Birmingham produced man-made wonders like the Gravelly Hill Interchange, better known as Spaghetti Junction. The space here is really interesting. A mass of concrete pillars and flyovers, at first glance it’s difficult to see how it all fits together, let alone how to navigate through it, but it works. It’s a complete triumph of function dictating form. Pedestrians have no place here. It’s alien, but strangely beautiful.

Spaghetti Junction: How it works is anyone’s guess

Meanwhile, the newest makeover of the city seems to be defined by one building: Selfridges. The outside is one thing, beautiful – especially if you squint a bit to block out the rest of the Bullring. But the inside is even better, a swirling atrium of white plastic, a space odyssey at the bottom of New Street.

The futuristic Selfridges building by the aptly named FutureSystems

Wander a bit further down through Digbeth, past the Chinese supermarkets and Irish pubs, and you’ll find the Custard Factory. Nestling in the shadow of St Martins and the Bullring, the old Bird’s custard factory is a revelation. It’s the antithesis of the wipe clean, plate glass Brum. It’s a mix of everything, old buildings and new design, brick walls and sleek concrete; a place where ultra cool record labels rub up against the National Trust and RIBA. This kind of design seems perfect to me, innovative and yet not too slick. Not over designed, not preening or exclusive. The Custard Factory is just right.

The Custard Factory

In fact, the most successful design elements of Birmingham are where the old and the new come together, creating a sense of somewhere that shouldn’t work, but does. Battered old pubs and markets squashed next to new civic icons; the weight of Dickensian industry alongside relics of the Sixties. This is what I think of when I think of Birmingham, and it warms the heart.

The Bullring
This Birmingham exists despite the planners best efforts. It seems the most inspirational spaces are there by happy accident. Maybe the best way to design the best spaces is to let it all happen naturally? To re-use buildings that already exist, rather than always ripping them out and starting again.