News Archive
Prince Charles Hosts Special Event for INTBAU
INTBAU’s Patron, His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales, has hosted a special reception for INTBAU to mark its 10th anniversary.
The event took place on 1 May at his private residence in London, Clarence House. The Prince praised INTBAU’s development and its network, which is now formed of 18 national Chapters established on almost every continent, and nearly 5,000 members and affiliated partners from around the world. The event hosted by The Prince of Wales was attended by INTBAU’s Chapter representatives, Members of its College of Traditional Practitioners (www.intbau.org/ictp.html), donors and supporters who celebrated ten years of the organisation’s work and achievements.
INTBAU undertakes a number of projects promoting traditional architectural design, academic programmes and hands-on training courses. Since its establishment 10 years ago, INTBAU has organised landmark international conferences such as the Venice Charter Revisited conference in 2006, has published three architectural books, has established an International Building Skills Programme in Romania which provides high quality training on medieval sites to up to 50 apprentices each year, and has organised a number of urban charrettes in Norway, India, Romania and Cuba.
Through its 18 Chapters INTBAU has developed summer schools on traditional design in Italy, France and the UK, architectural study tours in Norway, Germany, Romania and France, masonry courses in Nigeria and drawing from nature walking tours in Transylvania, Romania.
“Architecture in the Age of Austerity”
Prior to the special reception, INTBAU staged a major international conference in London to discuss what type of architecture we can afford in a recession. The keynote speaker was Lord Lamont, former Chancellor of the Exchequer who worked under the British Prime Ministers Margaret Thatcher and John Major. Norman Lamont said he is “very optimistic” about the future of the architectural profession despite last week’s announcement that Britain is in a double-dip recession, caused by a sharp decline in the construction industry.
Lord Lamont said that the UK economy is not isolated and that there will be new buildings built and new investment in infrastructure such as transport systems. “They might be in other parts of the world, but there will be work for star architects” he told the INTBAU conference attended by about 100 people from a number of countries, including the UK, India, Russia, Guatemala, Italy, Cuba, Poland, Cyprus, Germany and the USA.
The conference was organised in partnership with the Traditional Architecture Group (www.traditionalarchitecture.co.uk/) and the Notre Dame School of Architecture (http://architecture.nd.edu/).
Professor Scott Lash, The Rt Hon Lord Lamont, Alireza Sagharchi, and Paul Morrell OBE on the morning panel.
