A real place

The architecture critic Hugh Pearman has written a detailed review of MediaCityUK for the latest edition of the journal of the Royal Institute of British Architects, RIBA.   (The website is a weedy and spavined thing but the words and pictures make it worth persevering).

There's quiet a lot of faint praise:  "mid-table commercial" architecture is one verdict. . "The Wilkinson Eyre/ Chapman Taylor buildings for the BBC are slick-corporate, a bit dull, but perfectly OK".

But in the end, Hugh cheers up.

"MediaCityUK is already feeling like a real place to work and to visit. Architecturally it may be hit and miss at best, but the masterplan hangs together. This is not a bit of window-dressing regeneration, but the real thing, with real jobs, and a real variety of workspaces all based on the real broadcast media industry, which is huge. Coming here used to feel like coming to the ends of the earth. Now it may be far from perfect, but it IS a place. Once it’s populated, we might even start to like it".