My books.
Iconicon.
Shortlisted for the Architectural Book Awards 2023.
Out now in paperback, ebook and audio.
Barratt homes. Millennium monuments. Riverside flats. Wind farms. Spectacular skyscrapers. City centre apartments. Out of town malls.
Perhaps more so than any other cultural artefacts, the buildings designed in our lifetimes encapsulate how we as a culture imagined we one day might live. Whether modest or monumental, they offer a living history of Britain, a reminder of the forces that have shaped our modern landscape.
Iconicon is a journey around the Britain we have created since 1980: the horrors and delights, the triumphs and failures. From space-age tower blocks to suburban business parks, and from postmodernist exuberance to Passivhaus eco efficiency, this is an architectural grand tour and, I hope, a witty and engaging piece of social history.
Praise for Iconicon:
‘A love letter to contemporary buildings and a fantastic account of recent British history, rich in humour.’
NINA STIBBE
‘A punchy book takes a swing at Britain’s tacky shopping malls, bland housing estates and starchitect ego trips.’
THE TIMES BOOK OF THE WEEK
‘If the title makes you think this will be all about the big, shiny, funny-shaped public buildings (“icons”) that we all got used to from around the mid-1990s until the end of the 00s, be prepared for something darker, much more illuminating and rather sad. Chirpy though Grindrod’s prose style is, replete with pop references and hip asides, what he chronicles is the accelerating decline of the UK since 1980 as expressed through what we build. … Since Ian Nairn began his increasingly emotional journeys through British towns in the 1950s, various authors and broadcasters have followed hopefully in his footsteps, from Iain Sinclair via Jonathan Meades to Owen Hatherley. All good in their vastly different ways, but there’s one thing they tend not to do: quiz the actual people involved in making our towns and cities. This is where Grindrod’s chatty learning-worn-lightly style scores. He seeks them out, interviews them, enjoys their company, structures his book round them.’
HUGH PEARMAN, GUARDIAN
‘A brilliant, encyclopaedic, funny and often cutting dissection of the kaleidoscopic mess of buildings and places that the British created during most of our lifetimes. A sympathetic survey of the architectural remnants from the no such thing as society era.’
DANNY DORLING
‘Few writers on architecture can do what Grindrod does: he astutely observes the landscapes we all live in, weaves them into his own life, researches them with the doggedness of a true geek, talks to those that know them better than anyone – the ones who live in those landscapes – and recounts their stories with wit, passion and a shot of anger, directed with perfect aim at those in power.’
TOM DYCKHOFF
‘John Grindrod's follow-up to Concretopia is, if anything, even better. Again, he has spoken to everyone from council tenants to Right to Buyers to bankers to architects to politicians, and again, his observations are humane and acute. Here, he gives the post-Thatcher era as much benefit of the doubt as he can muster, but as the book goes on it builds into a justified anger, and ends with some very hard-won hope.’
OWEN HATHERLEY
‘In this eloquent, witty, passionate tour of Britain since the 1980s, John Grindrod provides a superb exposition of the politics and architecture that have shaped a landscape at once both familiar and already strangely historic. In its accounts of the best and worst of recent design, from the marvellous to the mundane to the frankly mean, this is a deeply humane book that does much to explain the world in which we live.’
JOHN BOUGHTON, author of MUNICIPAL DREAMS
‘Grindrod tells the story of the modern city from Thatcher to Today, taking in Po-Mo and PFI to Pop-Ups and pandemics. Politics, architecture and planning combine in a vital argument that the built environment is not just where we live but has a powerful impact on who we are. Grindrod is an architectural Daniel Defoe on a tour of our island, excavating our recent past, and our possible futures.’
LEO HOLLIS, author of CITIES ARE GOOD FOR YOU
‘It is welcome … when a writer looks at what we’re already familiar with from a different perspective … That’s better: someone who actually looks and sees — and is surprised. It’s such a relief.’
BOOKLAUNCH magazine
BUY THE BOOK
Either from your local bookshop or from:
Concretopia.
Tower Blocks. Flyovers. Streets in the Sky.
Once, this was the future.
From 1945 to 1979, this is the story of how blitzed, slum-ridden and crumbling ‘austerity Britain’ became, in a few short years, a space-age world of concrete, steel and glass.
Among other things Concretopia covers prefabs, the Festival of Britain, the blitz rebuilding of Coventry and Plymouth, the new towns of Cwmbran, Harlow, Cumbernauld and Milton Keynes, the rise of brutalism, Park Hill in Sheffield, high rise flats in the Gorbals and Newcastle, Arndale centres, the Bull Ring in Birmingham, Centre Point and Space House by Richard Seifert, Span and New Ash Green, the Poulson and T Dan Smith scandal, Ronan Point, the Barbican and the National Theatre.
Praise for Concretopia:
‘Wonderful . . . If you've ever wondered who gave planning permission for the serried ranks of concrete blocks you pass on the way to work, read Concretopia and lay the foundations of a new way of looking at modern Britain.’
INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY
‘Charming . . . Concretopia could pleasingly be read by anyone in Britain who lives in a postwar Modernist structure and has a love-hate relationship with it. Part-travelogue, part-history, Grindrod's account walks us through in touchingly precise detail the decisions that led to such buildings as the BT Tower, the Barbican, Coventry Cathedral and the blocks of New Ash . . . We don't think of architectural beauty as key to well-being and yet, as this book shows us, it profoundly is.’
ALAIN DE BOTTON, THE TIMES
‘Concretopia is almost certainly the first history of the post-war modernist project in British cities and towns, and it is without doubt the first to try and address a non-architectural, non-specialist audience ... [It’s] about the best history of the intersection of post-war architecture and politics (often with a small “p”) that you could hope for – personal, erudite, even-handed and driven by a subtle, but still present underlying anger at the dismantling of the Welfare State under the dubious banner of “austerity”.’
OWEN HATHERLEY
‘Fascinating throughout . . . does a magnificent job of making historical sense of things I had never really understood or appreciated . . . This is a brilliant book: a vital vade mecum for anyone (not just students of architecture and town planning) interested in Britain's 20th-century history.’
JAMES HAMILTON-PATERSON, author of EMPIRE OF THE CLOUDS
‘Fascinating . . . it's all here, from the Poulson scandal to abandoned ring-roads and vanishing industry . . . A great insight into the way things turned out the way they did.’
WALLPAPER MAGAZINE
‘Timely and pertinent . . . Grindrod is inventive with words and frequently alights on delightful and perceptive images . . . Particularly fascinating are chapters on the rebuilding of Coventry; the development of the South Bank; the creation of the Barbican (using concrete expensively pitted by hand using pickaxes); the replacement of the Glasgow Gorbals with new estates; the hilltop city that is Park Hill, Sheffield, recently renovated; the sad demise of low-rise, family-friendly ‘Span’ housing; the devastating 1968 collapse of the system-built tower block, Ronan Point; and the the tale of architect-developer John Poulson, who went to jail for corruption over building contracts.’
SUNDAY TELEGRAPH
‘Never has a trip from Croydon and back again been so fascinating. John Grindrod’s witty and informative tour of Britain is a total treat, and will win new converts to stare in awe (or at least enlightened comprehension) at Crap towns and Boring Postcards . . .’
CATHERINE CROFT, Director, Twentieth Century Society
‘With a cast of often unsung heroes – and one or two villains – Concretopia is a lively, surprising account of how Britain came to look the way it does.’
Will Wiles, author of CARE OF WOODEN FLOORS
‘A powerful and personal history of postwar Britain. Grindrod shows how pre-fab housing, masterplans, and tower blocks are as much part of our national story as Tudorbethan suburbs and floral clocks. It's like eavesdropping into a conversation between John Betjeman, J.G. Ballard and Jonathan Meades.’
LEO HOLLIS, author of CITIES ARE GOOD FOR YOU
BUY THE BOOK:
Outskirts.
Shortlisted for the Wainwright Prize.
Discover the strange hidden history of our green belts, from nuclear bunkers to buried landfill sites. And the story of my family too, growing up in a working class South London housing estate on the edge of the green belt with a funny car mechanic dad and a clever disabled mum. Along the way meet the planners, protestors, foresters and residents whose passions for and against the green belt tell a fascinating tale of Britain today.
With illustrations by Eleanor Crow.
Praise for Outskirts:
‘Grindrod's evocative and intelligent exploration of the green belt and its place in our national consciousness is part history and part memoir. He deftly weaves the two together, transforming what might otherwise have been a dry, technical discussion of planning and housing policy into a heartfelt narrative . . . One of the great strengths of Grindrod's book is his moving portrait of his late parents . . . [his] personal yet highly informative account of the origins and meaning of the green belt provides an excellent point of departure for an essential debate about its future, one that is likely to be contentious but is long overdue.’
PD SMITH, GUARDIAN
‘Illuminating and enjoyable . . . tolerantly and unsentimentally, he gets us close up to the green belt as it actually is today . . . what truly lifts it is the personal element, above all Grindrod's portrayal of family life.’
DAVID KYNASTON, SPECTATOR
‘Grindrod writes beautifully about nature . . . a lucid, evocative book, suffused with sadness and anger.’
LYNSEY HANLEY, FINANCIAL TIMES
‘Well-researched and engaging . . . It allows the reader to reconsider parts of the country that they might have taken for granted, and offers its own modest encomium to a part of England that seems under threat.’
ALEXANDER LARMAN, OBSERVER
‘A coherent, deeply researched study . . . the experience of Grindrod's very ordinary yet unique family upbringing forms a logical sequence underpinning much of what he says about the green belt.’
GILLIAN TINDALL, TLS
‘Fascinating.’
ROBERT MACFARLANE
‘A satisfying ramble through the Green Belt of past and future with a backpack full of research . . . thought-provoking [and] compelling.’
LAURA WADDELL, THE LIST
‘A terrific, and very moving read. Fascinating study in the emotional landscapes of cities. A hymn to the peripheral that is totally on target.’
LEO HOLLIS, author of CITIES ARE GOOD FOR YOU
‘What better lens to view the current friction between nature and our engorged cities than the Green Belt? A brilliant idea, brilliantly executed.’
TRISTAN GOOLEY, author of THE WALKER'S GUIDE
‘Outskirts is dotted with funny anecdotes and familiar cultural references from a 1970s childhood. Grindrod segues elegantly between memoir and fascinating social history.’
BBC COUNTRYFILE
BUY THE BOOK:
How To Love Brutalism.
A passionate and personal book about the writer's own love for a controversial architectural style, illustrated by The Brutal Artist.
Praise for How To Love Brutalism:
'An enjoyable read; lively and entertaining prose, which can make a serious point in a bright way.'
BUILDING ENGINEER
BUY THE BOOK: