Designer, writer and television presenter, Kevin McCloud leapt into our consciousness with his vastly successful Grand Designs UK. The affable architectural business owner talks about taking ownership and responsibility for the villages, towns, and cities in which we live.
I think people sometimes look at me simply as someone focused on developing and building houses, yet I feel much more passionate about the idea of making places; I find it is much more important to make communities and to see people flourish in where they live.
For years and years development has been top down. It’s been an industry where people have bought and sold land, upping its value through the planning process only to build rather crappy homes and buildings in the end.
I’m much more interested in the Gandhian approach, which is from the bottom up. It’s a democratic approach whereby people and communities work together to empower themselves to take control. That is often just down to a handful of individuals having a conversation with a landowner or a local authority or a local organisation and finding that, yes, they could do something. It’s discovering the fact they can take matters into their own hands, and there’s nothing more exciting than seeing people taking control for where they live.
We’ve all got used to this idea that if the paving stone outside our house is broken then it’s the council’s fault; or perhaps if the light doesn’t work it’s someone else’s fault; whereas actually, no, where we live is ours, and we should be taking responsibility. We should be taking ownership and we can do this through Community Land Trusts and all kinds of other ownership models and initiatives.
It’s discovering the fact they can take matters into their own hands, and there’s nothing more exciting than seeing people taking control for where they live.
I think it’s fundamental that we do this because that way we create a much more sustainable, coherent civic society. We create a world we are living in that can be shared, for the good of the people who invest in it and live in it, not for the faceless developers and entrepreneurs who are using the concept of home merely as a vehicle for making money.
It’s important because we are now seeing transition towns really flourish. These are places that have adopted this concept and are now moving on with a practical, architectural and community vibe and approach that knits together and unites so many different and important facets of what it is to live somewhere.
So next time you see something broken or tatty or perhaps just a bit shabby in your street, step forward, pick it up, take it into your workshop, or do whatever it is that’s needed to replenish it and make good.
A new series of Grand Designs UK is currently airing on TVNZ.
