SAVE Lecture: Just a certificate on the wall? UNESCO World Heritage status and the battle for the city

Liverpool Maritime Mercantile City UNESCO
Liverpool Maritime Mercantile City UNESCO

 

We were delighted that SAVE's 2017 annual lecture was given by architecture and design critic Oliver Wainwright, entitled:

Just a certificate on the wall? UNESCO World Heritage status and the battle for the city
 
To listen to an audio recording of the lecture, please click here
 


How can we balance World Heritage Site protection with the demands of a living, breathing city – or are the two hopelessly incompatible? Is World Heritage status an essential brake on steroidal development, or is it, in the words of the mayor of Liverpool, “just a certificate on the wall”? Variously attacked for leading to the “museumification” of sites, the mass influx of tourists, the displacement of local residents, and for being toothless to enforce protection anyhow, is UNESCO listing fit for purpose, or is it an outmoded hangover from another age?


 
Oliver Wainwright is the architecture and design critic of the Guardian. Trained as an architect at the University of Cambridge and the Royal College of Art, he worked for a number of practices, including OMA in Rotterdam and muf in London, as well as in strategic urban planning for the mayor of London's Architecture and Urbanism Unit. He has written extensively on architecture and design for a wide range of publications and is a regular visiting critic and lecturer at architecture schools internationally.
 

Place:   The Courtauld Institute of Art
       
        Strand
               London
               WC2R 0RN

Date:     Monday 16th October 2017
Time:     6-8:30pm. Tickets include a complimentary drink 6-6:30pm.
 
With thanks to The Courtauld Institute of Art for hosting us.