Towards a
Quietly
Technologised
Folk
Suburbia.
The crater city and the hedgerow village are two parts of a strategy for the hinterland to the new Foulness Airport. Instead of building an 'airport city' we propose to provide either of two extreme suburb types. The 'crater city' would be virtually a hotel for 16,000 people, with carpeted corridors and a very high level of servicing, air-conditioned apartments. It would have an outer wall which is a conservatory so that in summer the apartment would become one third bigger and in winter the two skins that sandwich the conservatory would insulate the apartment. The 'crater city' looks inward on to a large impeccably mown lawn a third of a mile across. This whole city is a circular crater and the outside of the circle is earth-banked up like a prehistoric mound with a ring of trees planted on the top. Nothing would be seen except this hill with trees.
The hedgerow village, by contrast, is a surreptitious development which is progressively fed into narrow strips alongside large fields. Each village would be imperceptible from the country lane. Each village would permit the implanting of a very wide range of dwelling types from 'architected' houses to wayfarers with sleeping bags and spanning through lean-tos, inflatable tents, caravans, etc, a deliberately relaxed and ramshackle combination/conglomeration.
Peter Cook
Archigram, Edited by Peter Cook, Warren Chalk, Dennis Crompton, David Greene, Ron Herron & Mike Webb, 1972 [reprinted New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 1999].