Trying to make a difference

Architecture is not among the best paid professions. The big well known names make a packet, but your local neighbour hood architect makes a living but not a lush one.

I am not sure it was the design of Grenfell Tower that was so drastically wrong as much as what had been done to it since it was built and the attitudes and decisions of those involved in its management.

Grenfell Tower and many such tower blocks, residential and commercial were built in the 1960s and 70s at a time when, in the post war euphoria, experts of all kinds were considered infallible and all beileved they could transform society by design. 50 years on we know better.

In the mid 1960s I worked in an office block of a similar design with a central service core, although it had two back to back staircases. It had a fire emergency and the fire staircase was unusable because rubbish piled against the door awaiting the bin men caught fire, while the other staircase was unlit and a disabled man had to be carried down 11 floors in the dark. I decided there and then that I would never, ever again work or live in such a design building again

Some architects are poor. Not all buildings are designed by architects. In the UK anyone without any qualifications is legally entitled to design a building of any size. In most other countries the law requires some or all buildings to be designed by architects. Architects have to study for a minimum of seven years. Unqualified people can describe themselves as "architectural consultants" or "architectural designers" and compete for work with architects. I do not know who designed Grenfell Tower.

Are architects poor?