LONDON, Nov. 9 (Xinhua) -- A slice of an internationally famous piece of Brutalist architecture has been acquired by London's V&A, the award winning museum announced Thursday.
The segment of a social housing scheme, Robin Hood Gardens in East London, is to be preserved by the V&A as a defining example of Brutalist architecture and social housing.
The 1970s estate, famed for its concrete streets in the air, is being demolished to make way for a modern housing scheme,
The three-storey section destined to become a museum piece. The fragment is 8.8 meters high, 5.5 meters wide and 8 meters deep, built in the early 1970.
The estate was designed by internationally recognized husband and wife team Alison and Peter Smithson, who are credited with coining the term Brutalism.
A spokesman for the V&A said: "Robin Hood Gardens is a significant example of the Brutalist movement in architecture, and joins the V&A's world-renowned architecture collections.
"Brutalism arose in the 1950s in reaction to the sleek and elegant glass structures of modernism and was characterized by the dramatic use of exposed concrete to create facades of often repeating geometrical forms. Not only a style but also a philosophy, Brutalism sought to reframe the relationship between society, architecture and urbanism."
For the Smithson's, Robin Hood Gardens was the culmination of their research on and vision for social housing. The estate was distinctive for its noise reducing features, like exterior concrete fins, and for its elevated walkways, known as "streets in the sky", intended to foster interaction between neighbors. They regarded Robin Hood Gardens "as a demonstration of a more enjoyable way of living, an exemplar of a new mode of urban organization".
No other British social housing project divided opinion to such a great extent as Robin Hood Gardens. The announcement its demolition in 2008 sparked one of the largest ever campaigns in architectural preservation, initiated by the Twentieth Century Society and supported by a number of international architects as well as leading architectural historians.
The site is now under development to replace the 252 flats with over 1,500 new homes, but at least a small part of Robin Hood Gardens will live on in one of Britain's most famous museums, the V&A.
