Nasty, brutish and tall

PRESTON bus station was earmarked for demolition in 1999. Instead, last year, English Heritage added it to a list of protected buildings. The structure—a hulking piece of 1960s brutalism—is not to everyone’s taste. The inside evokes a municipal swimming pool, or perhaps an airport terminal. The outside resembles a stack of tin trays. “Uncomfortable,” says Peter Rankin, a city councillor, who opposed campaigns to save it, although he admits impressive views can be seen from the top.

Brutalism, an architectural style that emerged after the second world war, is fairly common but not popular in Britain. The sharply angled concrete blocks look dismal under cloudy skies. “They are sublime,” says Jonathan Meades, a documentary film maker, “not pretty, or friendly.” Brutalism also had the bad luck to be used in social housing estates, like London’s Robin Hood Gardens and Sheffield’s Park Hill, and so came to stand for urban decay. Revamping town centres tends to mean tearing down brutalist buildings. But those who want to save them are now making some headway.