44 C O N T E X T 1 1 7 : N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 0 Book reviews Our secrets are safe Plandemonium: the best of Cowan’s cartoons on planning and urban design Rob Cowan, Streetwise Press, 2010, 156pp, ISBN 978 0 9544330 1 7, £9.95. Order online at www.streetwisepress.com I was chairman of the IHBC for three years and all they gave me was this teeshirt. Actually, the tee-shirt in question is a prized possession. It carries a large-scale cartoon by Rob Cowan showing someone wearing a badge that says ‘IHBC member and proud’.Why should this be funny? Well, because the person is clearly a complete nerd for whom pride is barely a concept. Also, the nerd is an exaggeration of someone we reluctantly suspect does exist somewhere not that far away. Cowan seems to champion these nerds, back-room boffins and underdogs of the witty closing punchlines. Then there is the glorious absurdity of a surreal approach in scenes reminiscent of Glen Baxter, another favourite cartoonist. For instance, the elimination of jargon from a policy statement that reduces it to the size of a postage stamp, or crazy variations on how we invented terms like sustainability or localism. Rob is, of course, a successful urban designer and there is delightful self-mockery running through his work. He recognises that the way urban design communicates through incomprehensible diagrams means our secrets are safe. That is quite funny, but then another voice compounds it by adding ‘Yes, even from ourselves’. While enjoying the humour, it is easy to overlook the skilled draughtsmanship with which it is presented. Rob has a terrific eye for detail and a deft pen. You would almost believe that, despite his accomplishments, he has spent half his life as a downtrodden office junior to understand it so well. Running behind the drawing and the wit are his distinctively vibrant watercolour backgrounds that liven up the prose context of the publications they occupy. Now, instead of waiting for the next issue of Context, Planning or the Architects’ Journal, you can reach for a handy volume containing 150 of Rob Cowan’s best cartoons on planning and design. In the one-to-a-page format they are larger than the thumbnails we are accustomed to so we can linger more and appreciate the craftsmanship. This comes highly recommended. Not only because we need a good laugh at the moment, but because we also need someone to keep our feet on the ground in the face of pomposity, jargon and half-communicated ideas. ‘Spatial planning? I can assure you young man, there’s no such thing.’ Eddie Booth, director of the Conservation Studio Undiluted water Spas, Wells and Pleasure-Gardens of London James Stevens Curl, Historical Publications, 2010, 280pp, 194 ills in colour and b&w, ISBN 978 1 9052863 4 8, £25 In the space of fewer than 250 pages, James Stevens Curl has made a valuable contribution to the specialist knowledge of sites and buildings in the capital and its outskirts. The subject is the development of places associated with the former leisure pursuit of water drinking, including other entertainments such as smoking, drinking, and therapies not generally on the medical curriculum. For invalids, the search for the curative effects of certain waters was not wholly a matter of pleasure but related to the medical properties then believed to be important. Such cures are normally dismissed in the UK today, although they still hold considerable sway in many other parts of Europe. In some, the building of new spas continues. A centre such as Montecatini in Northern Tuscany (worth visiting for its catalogue of 19th and 20th century architectural styles) has continued to make vigorous updates to its buildings into recent times. I write fromTunbridge Wells, whose original fame rests almost wholly on the popularity of its water. As people were drawn to the town from its 17th century beginnings up to its Victorian ROBCOWAN StreetwisePress ThebestofCowan’s cartoons onplanningandurbandesign Sponsoredby FrancisTaylorBuilding Town planners, urban designers, highway engineers, lawyers, architects,historicbuilding conservationists,urban regenerators, landscapedesigners, surveyors:nogroupofurbanprofessionals has been spared the well-aimed mockery of Cowan’s cartoons. Plandemoniumcollects thebest from20yearsofhis insights into the strangeworldof planning and urban design. StreetwisePress £9.95 who keep things going despite the faceless march of progress. ‘What’s the report for? Oh, there’s a report-sized gap on the shelf.’ He uses them to question orthodoxies, such as the notion that local development frameworks were meant to be simpler and more accessible. They also expose our reliance on jargon: two unemployed hoodies earnestly agree ‘I’m looking for a job that involves the mediation of space’. The success of the cartoons is this sense of everyman that we can all relate to: ‘The assertiveness course was so useful that now I’m doing one on anger management’. Although I have to say that everywoman tends to come off better. She is definitely more human and gets to deliver more
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MjgyMjA=