Introduction
Following the untimely death of the architect Zaha Hadid on
31 March 2016 many reports made reference to the ill-fated Cardiff Bay Opera
House. Had that proposal progressed it might have been one of her first major
public commissions in the UK. The promoters of the project sought financial
support from the Millennium Commission in 1995 and a spurious contest, largely
initiated by the media, arose between it and the Wales Millennium Stadium for
such funding. References to the affair almost invariably suggest that a choice
was presented to the wider public between those projects, one portrayed as
elitist and the other determinedly populist. The incorrect impression that the
Hadid Opera House was rejected in favour of the Stadium is perpetuated, not
least by statements such as that on the latter’s website which asserts that;
“After competition from the proposed
Cardiff Bay Opera House” the Millennium Commission agreed to support the
redevelopment of the Cardiff Arms Park in March 1996.
Here it is argued that the public debate was influential but
not decisive in the failure to proceed with the Zaha Hadid design. Other factors
contributed to that failure, some of which preceded that wider public debate.
A first- hand account the Cardiff Bay Opera House project
(the Opera House) was offered by Lord Crickhowell (1997, 1999) who, as Nicholas
Edwards, Secretary of State for Wales, was one of its instigators and later
chaired the Cardiff Bay Opera House Trust (The Trust). Crickhowell’s account is
accurate as to the facts but subjective and selective in their interpretation
and presentation. A reviewer suggested that, by simply reading between the
lines of Crickhowell’s 1997 book, the '…seeds
of the Opera's downfall were laid' during the chairmanship of the Trust by
his predecessor, Mathew Pritchard (Hannay 1997 p28). In this paper it is
suggested that earlier decisions which led to the establishment of that Trust
contributed to its failure.
The background to
the Cardiff Bay Opera House project to 1995
The Welsh National Opera (WNO) was established as a company
in 1948 and, whilst based in and around Cardiff, utilised venues for
performances which lacked the requisite backstage and support facilities. The
need for a home for the WNO was identified in a 1984 report for the Arts
Council of Great Britain. In 1985 Nicholas Edwards, as Secretary of State for
Wales, and Matthew Prichard, Chairman of the Welsh Arts Council, commissioned
separate reports on Housing the Visual Arts in Wales and on Housing the Performing
Arts. At that time Wales offered a variety of venues but none that could
accommodate major touring opera or musical theatre productions.
A report for the Welsh Arts Council on the Centre for
Performing Arts published in September 1986 concluded that it should be a
popular entertainment centre suitable for musicals, pantomime and other events
with a mass appeal and that 16 weeks should be the period allotted to
performances by WNO. Further feasibility and planning studies were commissioned
by the Welsh Arts Council, supported by the Welsh Office, Cardiff City Council
and South Glamorgan County Council, and undertaken during 1987.
At its
inception the project was therefore intended to be a ‘popular entertainment
centre for the performing arts’ and had the support of the Secretary of State
for Wales and the local government authorities.
In 1988 the new Secretary of State for Wales, Peter Walker,
announced that a site would be set aside in the Cardiff Bay Development
Corporation (CBDC) area. Some early
design proposals for the Cardiff Bay redevelopment had included, albeit
vaguely, a centre for the performing arts or opera house in a prominent
waterfront location on land owned by Associated British Ports (ABP). Walker
also made the suggestion that the building be called the Cardiff Bay Opera
House (Crickhowell 1997 p7 & p144,
Best 2004 p208).
Although
that title was not formally adopted until 1991 the direction set by Walker that
this would be an ‘opera house’ on ABP land within the Cardiff Bay area proved
to be a critical factor.
CBDC set up a Steering Group in Dec 1990 involving
representatives of WNO, the Welsh Arts Council, Cardiff City Council and South
Glamorgan County Council. The site owners were represented by Nicholas Edwards,
the former Secretary of State for Wales, by then Lord Crickhowell and a non-executive
director of ABP. The steering group commissioned feasibility studies from
various consultants which were submitted to the Welsh Office in Oct 1991. That
was followed in Dec 1991 by a request for a pledge of Welsh Office funding for
£5m for preparatory work and a further £20m on a contingency basis for the
construction of the building, to be called on only in the event of successful
fund-raising effort from other matching sources (Burrows 2004).
By 1992, when David Hunt had become Secretary of State for
Wales, the project appears to have been even more expressly stated as the
development of an opera house for WNO as part of the development of Cardiff
Bay. During that year the prospect
emerged of National Lottery Funding for large capital projects of a cultural
and civic nature. In November 1992 the recommendation was made that a separate
trust be established to carry out the project. Paul Koralek, architectural
adviser to the Steering Group, suggested selecting an architect for the project
by means of a competition.
The Cardiff Bay Opera House Trust (The Trust) was
established in November 1992 as a company limited by guarantee. The competition
to select an architect was initiated and Welsh Office approval was secured for
CBDC to fund the Trust’s work on a short-term rolling basis. This was an
important factor in that CBDC was funding the Trust which was then effectively
a subsidiary body as regards command of financial resources. Facilitating the
building of an opera house was not in the core mission statement of the urban
development corporation but was considered complementary to its overall
objectives.
By 1992 when
the Trust was established what had been originally conceived as a ‘popular
entertainment centre for the performing arts’ was referred to specifically as an
‘opera house’. Furthermore this was to be;
·
within the Cardiff Bay area,
the Development Corporation having been established by Edwards/ Crickhowell and;
·
built on land owned by ABP, a privatised company that Edwards/
Crickhowell had joined as a Non-Executive Director.
From the
outset The Trustees had limited autonomy, being reliant upon the resources
granted by CBDC and the other direct stakeholders, who included the Welsh
Office and ABP. Any aspirations for architectural patronage on its part were
potentially governed and influenced by the wider priorities of those
stakeholders.
The Brief and design selection
In 1993 a further brief was prepared for a building with a
main auditorium suitable for opera with 1,750 to 1,900 seats and an estimated budget
of £43.25m. That brief also included
provision of an integral car park for 600 cars. This proved to be problematic
for a number of reasons; not least the disproportionate impact on estimated
cost. Essentially, an integral car park required the same standard of external
design and materials as the opera house. The positioning of the car park also
became a contentious issue with ABP. In the course of events it also conferred
upon opponents of the project the opportunity to suggest that the integral car park
had been a requirement of Trustees who expected a reserved parking space.
The appointment of an Assessment Panel to select an
architect was also to have ‘profound
consequences’ (Crickhowell 1997 p18). The Chairman of the Trust,
Mathew Pritchard, had announced that he intended to exercise his prerogative
and, advised by Paul Koralek, chose the Assessors for the competition ‘…in order to avoid argument among the Trustees’
(Crickhowell 1997 p18).
The panel appointed were;
-
Lord Peter Palumbo, then Chairman of the Arts
Council
-
Professor Richard Silverman, Head of the Welsh
School of Architecture and Chair of CBDC’s Design and Architecture Review Panel
-
Michael Wilford, Architect
-
Professor Francesco Dal Co, chair of architectural
history, University of Venice
-
Paul Koralek, architectural adviser to the Trust
-
Lord (Jack) Brooks Deputy Chair of CBDC
-
Lord David Davies, Chair of WNO and;
-
Mathew Pritchard, Chair of the Trust
Freddie Watson of Grosvenor
Waterside, the property development subsidiary of ABP, was a non-voting
observer representing the owner of the proposed site of the Opera House.
The Trust delegated to the Panel the task of selecting the
best design and their brief encompassed the operational requirements for the building including
acoustics, layout and some initial assessment of feasibility.
Discernment, one of the characteristics of
architectural patronage, was thereby novated from the Trust to the panel
appointed by its chairman.
Crickhowell states that chairmanship of both the Trust and
the Assessment Panel placed on Mathew Pritchard ‘…an unfair burden of responsibility… particularly in the light of later
controversy” (Crickhowell 1997 p18). It can be argued that a key
responsibility of the Chairman was to ensure that;
·
There was no confusion as to the role of the
panel appointed by the Trust and
·
that no conflict arose between the Trust and the
Panel arising from the recommendation of the latter.
Another interpretation is that, in taking the decision to
personally appoint the panel, Pritchard selected members that were
‘unrepresentative’. This suggests that a Panel dominated by architectural
academics and wealthy private patrons in their own right might inevitably
select a design which would be too sophisticated to be understood and accepted
by those less well qualified.
Crickhowell makes the comment that one of the shortcomings of the
competition system was that the choice was made by the selection panel after
“….an inevitably short technical and cost
assessment…in which the client is hardly involved” (Crickhowell 1997 p23). The ensuing problems appear to be less
attributable to the competence of the selection panel than the failure of the Trust
to clearly recognise and establish who the ‘client’ was in this instance.
The
Trust as the promoter – or patron- appear to have regarded itself and the WNO,
as primary user- and ‘clients’- rather than the wider public who would be using
(and paying) for the building.
In June 1993 the architectural competition for the building
design was launched and the assessment of submissions took place through the
rest of that year. Four finalists were chosen together with four pre-selected
firms of architects who had been invited to submit proposals. Crickhowell
expressed particular disappointment at the latter and implied that the overall
quality of submissions might have been higher if there had been better
engagement and more dialogue with competitors (Crickhowell 1997 pps 21-22).
In September 1994 a colloquium was held where the
short-listed designs were displayed and public comment invited. At that event a
representative of the Western Mail, a
regional newspaper, requested, and was denied, photographs of the exhibits
leading it to complain that the colloquium was an inadequate form of public
consultation. The Trust were warned by their then manager, Adrian Ellis, and
Freddie Watson of Grosvenor Waterside that it was a potentially serious mistake
to alienate the local media at that stage.
Crickhowell comments that the final decision to select Zaha
Hadid as their preferred architect was taken by the Assessment Panel “..in secret conclave” suggesting that
if they had discussed their recommendation with those Trustees who were not
Assessors, it might have been possible to come to a choice about which there was
a broad measure of agreement (Crickhowell 1997 p23). Some Assessors were,
however, clear in their decision to select the design proposal submitted by
Hadid and still maintain that this was;
“…. head and shoulders
above anything else, anybody else. I think if we had to pick a second or third
we would have been hard pressed to do it. She was that much ahead” (Palumbo 2015 p2).
That view was endorsed by the chair of CBDC’s Design
Advisory Panel, Professor Richard Silverman who represented the Corporation on
the Assessment Panel. It is doubtful, therefore, that their recommendation
would have altered. That the assessors were not themselves unanimous in their
decision was evidenced by Lord Brooks who stated that they ‘..had been unduly influenced by the architect members, who had
appeared to favour a particular school of architecture’ (Crickhowell 1997 p30).
The key
point here is that better dialogue within the Trust and with its Assessment
Panel might have ensured agreement that members publicly support that decision
rather than voice their dissent. This also relates to the earlier issues
concerning its leadership and management.
Dispute also developed within the Trust’s sponsor body and a
‘senior Board member of CBDC’ circulated a lengthy paper attacking the decision
to select Hadid (Crickhowell p28). Doubts were expressed as to the likely cost
of the preferred design and Crickhowell makes reference to the Sydney Opera
House and the parallel between its
architect and Hadid in terms of experience in managing large scale projects
(Crickhowell 1997,pps25-27). The suggestion that the Trust were effectively
re-considering the recommendation of their assessment panel triggered adverse
comment in the architectural press, both in support of Hadid and in opposition
to her design. CBDC declared their reservations on the winning design and
requested that the expenditure earmarked for advancing and testing it be
redirected to assessing the relative feasibility of the four final designs.
It is in
reference to this action of CBDC that Crickhowell refers to failure in ‘..establishing the proper patron-client
structure’(Crickhowell 1997 p27).
An exhibition was mounted at the National Museum of Wales in
October 1994 whereby public comment was invited. This favoured the Foster
design and generated some wider criticism of the Hadid proposal. Locally the
situation was further exacerbated by the Cardiff Bay Business Forum who invited
the other shortlisted architects to make presentations (Crickhowell 1997 pps35-36). The Forum was an
organisation representing the interests of mostly small businesses in the Bay
area, not the wider community. Nevertheless their intervention effectively extended
a form of public consultation exercise and moved it further away from the
management and control of the Trust or CBDC.
It can
then be noted that the selection of Zaha Hadid was contentious but much of the
ensuing controversy might have been avoided by better management of processes
and relationships.
Crickhowell became Chairman of the Trust’s Building
Committee in October 1994 and that month the Millennium Commission agreed to consider
the Cardiff Bay Opera House project.
In November 1994 Rhodri Morgan MP questioned the then
Secretary of State for Wales, John Redwood, asking if he had consulted with the
chairman of the Cardiff Bay Development Corporation and the Millennium Fund Commission
regarding the choice of architect for the proposed Opera House. Redwood,
responded that the choice of architect was not a matter for him but he had
spoken to the chairman of the Cardiff Bay Development Corporation urging him to
“….allow the public to have a full
opportunity to see the different designs and give their views, and for these to
be taken in account by the trustees in coming to their decision on which design
to build” (HANSARD. HC Deb 28 November 1994 vol 250 c533W 533W)
Redwood had been critical of the chosen design at the Welsh
Conservative Conference the previous month and had effectively suggested a
public referendum to decide the issue.
Rather
than publicly confirming the same level of support as his predecessors as
Secretary of State Redwood therefore appears to have distanced himself from the
project and its promotion.
In early December 1994 Pritchard resigned as Chair of the
Trust and was succeeded by Crickhowell who admitted to “… one serious error in my handling
of the whole business” (Crickhowell 1997 pps153-154). That was the recognition, in
hindsight, that the relationship arrangement with CBDC had been problematic
from the outset. Interestingly the admission includes his supposition that,
having created the organization and appointed its Chairman “..any potential difficulties could be overcome by the use of
well-established relationships.”
In that
respect his patronage, meaning the appointment of his nominees to public
office, was not beneficial.
In accepting the chairmanship Crickhowell became a foreground
figure who accentuated the ambiguity of the relationship between The Trust,
CBDC as principal sponsor and ABP as landowner. As a non-executive director of
ABP, Crickhowell recognised a potential conflict of interest and initially had
no formal position with the Trust. He became directly involved in the Trust
only after the terms of land acquisition for the Opera House had been agreed
with ABP. There were, nevertheless a range of issues that arose from that
commercial relationship, not least questions relating to probity.
Dispute had already arisen with the ABP subsidiary,
Grosvenor Waterside, through Freddie Watson, who had been the senior civil
servant at the Welsh Office and credited by Crickhowell as a key figure in the
establishment of CBDC (Crickhowell 1999 p91). Watson had joined Grosvenor
Waterside as their local director and his duty then lay with their commercial
interests. As one of the principal critics of the Hadid proposals his view
conflicted with that of Crickhowell, now a Non-Executive Director of Grosvenor
Waterside’s parent company, ABP. Watson was ‘invited to take early retirement’
and replaced with another Crickhowell nominee.
Crickhowell’s commercial relationship with ABP as a
Non-Executive director had been called to question by opponents of the Cardiff
Bay Barrage and presented to critics of the Opera House fresh opportunity to
insinuate such conflicts. Prominent among these was Rhodri Morgan MP. Morgan’s
opinions on the opera house also led to further disagreement between him and Alun
Michael MP, who was Deputy Chairman of the Trust. Lord Brooks, Deputy Chair of
CBDC subsequently fell out with Alun Michael over the Opera House to the extent
that the latter was not allowed to campaign in his own constituency for the new
Shadow Authority that preceded the 1996 local government reorganisation. The
priority of the Leader of the County Council, Russell Goodway, was to win that
forthcoming election and, if the proposed Opera House were the source of
further internal division within the local Labour Party, he was politically
inclined to oppose it (Goodway 2014 p6).
Goodway’s
position, which was to prove influential, was thereby prejudiced against the
Opera House as being divisive within his political party whereas the ‘rival’
Stadium project emerged as one with more ready appeal to the electorate.
Zaha Hadid was confirmed as the preferred architect for the
building in Jan/ Feb 1995. In Feb 1995 a bid was submitted to the Millennium
Commission for Lottery Funding for £50m. As that was being submitted a
(revised) bid to the Commission was being prepared seeking funding for the
redevelopment of the National Stadium at Cardiff Arms Park.
Some observations on the evolution of the Opera House
project to 1995 are summarised as follows;
·
Between 1984 and 1992 there was a convergence of
the objectives of a) providing a major lyric theatre or centre for the
performing arts and b) securing a suitable home for the Welsh National Opera,
the latter appearing to be the primary intent of the Trustees.
·
Whilst a long standing aspiration of opera
supporters in South Wales the promoters of the project did not clearly
establish the desire, need or support of the wider public.
·
The presentation of the project as an Opera House
in Cardiff Bay alienated those opposed to a disproportionate investment in the
city. Resourcing the Trust through the Cardiff Bay Development Corporation
compounded that perception.
·
From the outset the Trust lacked the autonomy
enjoyed by patrons of architecture historically, but underestimated the
influence that its sponsors and stakeholders might exert upon its decisions.
·
The appointment of a highly qualified Assessment
Panel further removed the selection of an architect from trustees and their
sponsors. Subsequent division and disagreement on design matters within the
Trust and, perhaps more importantly, between it and the sponsoring bodies, undermined
wider confidence in the project.
·
The initiation of the project by Nicholas
Edwards and his leading role (as Lord Crickhowell) in the Trust further
polarised opposition from some quarters, not least due to his relationship with
the landowner, ABP.
·
Within the city and county councils the proposal
did not enjoy cohesive political support
The
proposals for the Cardiff Bay Opera House designed by Zaha Hadid were therefore
the subject of controversy and, by 1995, could be said to have been compromised
or weakened.
The Background to the Cardiff Arms Park/ Millennium
Stadium project to 1995
Rugby football and other sports were played from around 1850
on the area of land in Cardiff that became known as Cardiff Arms Park. A union
of Welsh rugby clubs had existed from 1875, a more formal body emerging around
1881 and the title Welsh Rugby Union (WRU) adopted in 1934. (Smith and Williams 1980). International rugby games
were played at Cardiff and elsewhere in Wales until June 1953 when the WRU
decided "That until such time as the
facilities at Swansea were improved, all international matches be played at
Cardiff" (Harris 1984)
The status of Cardiff Arms Park as the ‘national’ rugby
stadium was consolidated through further development ahead of the 1958 British
Empire and Commonwealth Games which brought its overall capacity to 60,000. The
success of the national rugby team from the late 1960’s and the rebuilding of
the Arms Park as a National Stadium in the 1970s gave the city a focus for
Wales and Welsh pride. The observation was made by Martin Johnes that the
decision to hold all international matches in Cardiff may have been taken as
the facilities and profits were better there. However, it also gave Cardiff
some relevance in the wider Welsh community as “…in the absence of the traditional apparatus of a nation state, sport
played an integral role in developing and sustaining a popular sense of Welsh
national identity.” ( (Johnes 2012). A similar point was made by
Rhodri Morgan in that much of Wales’ self-image as a nation rested on it being
a separate country for sporting purposes. (Morgan 1994 p17). The (then) National Stadium could
be described as the principal institution of nationhood and was very much central to Cardiff’s function as a capital.
The
centrality of the National Stadium to Welsh identity and its symbolic and
cultural importance to the wider community would therefore have been considered
a given by many in 1995.
In 1994 a committee was set up to look at redeveloping the
Wales National Stadium. The catalyst for this was the intention to bid for the 1999
Rugby World Cup (RWC99). The National Stadium, designed in 1962, had a capacity
of only 53,000 which included 11,000 standing in the East Terrace. New safety
regulations would mean that would be further reduced by 'all-seated'
arrangements and the stadium offered no spectator facilities other than
toilets. Various development options
were considered for the existing Stadium but an alternative presented was to
construct a completely new facility elsewhere. One location offered and
considered was the Island Farm Site south of Bridgend, 20 miles west of
Cardiff.
The
primary concern of the Local Authority was the potential economic impacts on
the city were the Stadium to be relocated. Their initial motivation for
engagement was then the threat that the National Stadium be relocated
elsewhere.
In the view of the Leader of (the then) South Glamorgan
County Council the economic case justified allocation of Council
resources to supporting the WRU in the bid for the RWC99 and redevelopment of
the Stadium. Furthermore the decision to do so was taken quickly as the RWC99
bid had to be submitted within six weeks of his initial engagement with the WRU
on the issue. In February 1955 Council officers prepared the presentation
material for that bid (Talfan Davies 2008 p153).
More direct engagement then followed in;
i)
Jointly lobbying other Rugby Unions for their
support of the bid for RWC99 and
ii)
Presenting the proposals for the redevelopment
of the National Stadium to WRU regions and clubs to secure their support.
The recently established National Lottery had been
identified as a potential source of funding and the WRU had submitted a new
National Stadium for consideration as one of the major UK projects of the
Millennium Commission. Their initial proposal had been rejected by the
Millennium Commission and the Leader of the local authority asked the WRU to
suppress that information while he sought a way to reverse the decision. The Leader
then took the matter in hand by enlisting the help of intermediaries to secure
a personal meeting with the Millennium Commissioner who had been influential in
the rejection of the initial bid.
The Commissioner was persuaded to support a
revised bid but did so with certain conditions.
As a
result of that meeting there was a crucial shift in emphasis in the revised
bid. That was that the application be submitted by a partnership for what would
be a NATIONAL Stadium and not exclusively or primarily a WELSH RUGBY UNION
Stadium.
The City Council effectively prepared and submitted the
revised funding application, not the WRU.
Crickhowell was approached with the proposition that funding
for both the Stadium and the Opera House could be secured with full support of
Council BUT the Stadium had to take priority to accommodate the Rugby World Cup
in 1999. Crickhowell asserted that Virginia Bottomley, a former Cabinet
colleague and chair of the Millennium Commission, had indicated that Cardiff could
not have two Commission funded major projects. The Leader of the local
authority went directly to Bottomley who stated that;
·
each project would be considered on merit and that,
·
there was no technical reason why two projects
could not be awarded to the same city or region.
Crickhowell was again approached and still refused to give
the stadium priority. He was advised that it would therefore be put to the
(controlling) Labour group on the local authority that they openly support the
Stadium bid. That was affirmed and was then publicly announced by the Leader in
October 1995 at the Cardiff Business Club where Crickhowell was presenting the
Opera House proposal (Crickhowell 1997 pps86-87).
The initial observations that can be made on the evolution
of the Stadium project to 1995 are that;
·
The centrality of the stadium and its principal
function – International Rugby Football- to Cardiff’s status as a capital had
been established from the mid- 1950’s. It was widely valued as a public amenity
and a physical representation of symbolic and cultural capital.
·
The aspiration of the WRU and Local Authority
was widely shared and enjoyed public support, a critical factor in securing
funding from the Millennium Commission.
·
The explicit threat that the national stadium
might be relocated elsewhere ensured the direct support of the local authority
who devoted significant resources to ensure that both the bid for the Rugby
World Cup 1999 and funding were advanced
·
A focussed and cohesive partnership was formed
between the WRU and local authority with leadership coming effectively from the
latter.
The media inspired ‘contest’
“It is precisely the purpose of the public opinion generated
by the press to make the public incapable of judging, to insinuate into it the
attitude of someone irresponsible, uninformed.”
The proposition that there be a new national stadium that
would facilitate a credible bid to host the Rugby World Cup of 1999 emerged
publicly in early 1995 as the Trust were submitting their bid to the Millennium
Commission. The erroneous suggestion that the two projects might necessarily
have to compete for such funding developed into a public debate in which the
media, both newspapers and broadcasters, “..played
a depressingly predictable part” (Talfan Davies 2008 p153). It is unclear as to whether
this was initiated by the media or opponents of the Opera House. Crickhowell,
perhaps predictably, infers that there was a pro-active campaign on the part of
rugby supporters (Crickhowell 1997 p86). The promoters of the opera
house had, however, already alienated the local media to some extent as noted
above.
The general tone of media coverage was concisely outlined by
Talfan Davies as follows.
i) The Stadium was presented with the positive
assertion that ‘Rugby is our great national game’
ii)
The Opera House was presented with two
negatives;
‘We all hate modern architecture, don’t we?’ and
‘Opera is for toffs’.
The first of these assertions may be taken as a given,
particularly if the volume of regional media coverage devoted to rugby union
football evidenced it to be the pre-eminent sport in Wales. Elsewhere in his
account Talfan Davies emphasises the importance of rugby when, as Controller of
BBC Wales, he took a call in 1997 to say that they had lost the rights to Welsh
Rugby.
“It was a massive blow,
far and away the lowest point in my ten years at the BBC. Rugby was at the
heart of our television service, both in its content and its economics, and a
key to our identification with the Welsh audience.” (Talfan Davies 2008 p109)
As regards a general antipathy to modern architecture, that
can be seen as part of the zeitgeist at that time. Talfan Davies makes reference to the Prince of
Wales who, by the author’s admission, made no direct intervention on the Hadid
design of the Cardiff Bay Opera House. The tenuous link was made through the
role of Paul Koralek, architectural adviser to the Trust. Koralek had been a
partner in Ahrends, Burton and Koralek (ABK Architects) who had designed the
proposed extension to the National Gallery, London described by the Prince in
1982 as a "monstrous carbuncle on
the face of a much-loved and elegant friend" (Glancey 2004). Were some personal view of
the Prince to be implied then the presence of Lord Palumbo on the Assessment
Panel might also be cited. His proposal for a Mies van de rohe building at
Mansion House Square in the city of London had also attracted widely publicised
opposition from the Prince which contributed to the failure to realise that
project (Jamieson 2009). What is perhaps implied by
Talfan Davies is that the Prince’s views had increasingly informed the public
temper and to some extent articulated public opinion at that time (Jencks 1988, Glancey 2004, Moore 2009).
Coupled with this the support for Zaha Hadid from sections
of the architectural community can be seen to have further polarised views. Crickhowell
quotes Colin Amery, who he describes as ‘…predictably
the Prince of Wales’ adviser’, as accusing Hadid of representing ‘the kind of absurd architectural arrogance that the public has long learned to
distrust’ (Crickhowell 1997 p28).
The failure of novel architectural innovation to win
widespread acclaim is neither new nor confined to a particular region.
Regrettably some of the resistance to the selection of Hadid was seen to be
both xenophobic and misogynistic (Talfan Davies 2014, Palumbo 2015). Crickhowell was asked directly whether this was
a factor and responded;
"If she had been male, white and Welsh would it have
been different? I do not know. I hope not. There are those who tell me I am
naive. I really don't know ... but I suspect that if it had been a young
Welsh-speaking architect who had suddenly produced the design, the Western Mail
might have taken a different line." (Patel 1997)
Many years after the event it was still being reported in
the national press that Rhodri Morgan, who had since become First Secretary of
the Welsh Assembly, had likened her design to a heretical version of the Ka’bah
in Mecca, believing that a fatwa would descend upon Cardiff (Ward 2007, Jacobs 2013). The response to such utterances were
increasingly patronising or derogatory comments made about Wales and the Welsh
by supporters of Hadid (Glancey 1995, Sudjic 2004).
The
impact of media reportage may then be seen to be influential not only in the
outcome of this particular case but prejudicial to external perceptions of
architectural aspiration in the region.
Any cohesive or vigorous defence of the chosen architect
locally had already been compromised by the disagreement as to that choice
between members of the selection panel, the Trustees and their sponsors, CBDC.
The wider public, making no great distinction between the Trust and its
sponsors, would infer a lack of confidence in the selected design within the
organisation promoting it. Crickhowell recognised that this was a critical
factor in damaging public relations (Crickhowell 1997 p145). It is understandable that
the Trust “… took a firm decision not to
engage in a slanging match with the rugby supporters” (Crickhowell 1997 p146).
As regards the ‘ opera is for toffs ‘ issue referred to by
Talfan Davies, Crickhowell makes extensive reference to the perceptions of
elitism in his account. Particular mention is made of the campaign by The Sun newspaper and also to hostile
and misleading stories in the Daily Mail (Crickhowell 1997p140,p143). One can have some sympathy with Crickhowell’s complaint that opera
was held by the media to be more elitist than rugby (Crickhowell 1997 p143). Wales had a strong tradition
of local amateur opera and musical societies in ‘working class’ communities and
the perception of opera being enjoyed largely by a privileged class were
overstated. However, the WNO did not enjoy unqualified support in some quarters
of the wider arts community in Wales where there were perceptions that it
received a disproportionate allocation of funding from the regional Arts
Council.
This has relevance to the issue of conflicting priorities in
specific fields of activity and the question as to whether to make;
i)
Further investment in those individuals or
fields of demonstrable excellence or
ii)
More investment in improving areas of perceived
weakness
Within the arts there were then factional interests opposed
to a proposal which might absorb a relatively large proportion of the regional
budget. These were antipathetic to the case for an Opera House being a
‘flagship’ of the arts in Wales.
Some further aspects relating to elitism may be noted in
passing.
a)
A political dimension in that some viewed the
Trust, by association, as another of the self-selected elites that manned the
‘Quango State’. It is a matter of fact that many were appointees and opponents
could claim that those supporting the Hadid design were, in the main, unelected
and unrepresentative of wider society.
b)
However, conditions that were later made by the
Welsh Government for funding necessary to complete access ways to the new
stadium were directed specifically at the unrepresentative governance of the
WRU.
c)
Whilst rugby, as a sport, enjoyed great
popularity in the region it is questionable whether access to international
games at the stadium is any less elitist than attendance at an opera. The
stadium is essentially a private sports facility and admission to it for an
international rugby match no less exclusive than opera.
The straw polls conducted by the local media indicated that
numerically the stadium would have a three to one advantage were a decision
between the two projects to be the matter of public referendum. As Controller
of BBC Wales at that time Geraint Talfan Davies stated that;
“One of the very few occasions when I was loudly critical of
my own BBC Wales newsroom was when it ran a telephone poll within the evening
news programme, Wales Today, asking people to choose. Telephone polls are
notoriously unscientific and usually designed to confirm rather than confound
prejudices. This was no exception. I thought that they had no place in BBC news
programmes, and instructed that they should not be repeated.”(Talfan Davies 2008 pps 154-155)
The observation must be made that Talfan Davies’
intercession on the manner of news coverage could be seen to be a form of media
patronage in tempering the negative tone of news reportage. He was, in that
respect, a critical friend of the Opera House project as a prominent public and
private patron of the arts and architecture in Wales who became Chair of the
WNO (twice) and Chair of the Arts Council of Wales.
However, one can concur with his view that such journalistic
methods posed entirely false choices and inevitably produce a predictable and
familiar pattern in arguments about arts funding. Such false choices are frequently
presented by the opponents of publicly funded development whereby values may be
represented by other public amenities and services they hold to be more
essential. This is also touched upon by Crickhowell who stated that;
“The press were constantly publishing letters from irate
readers demanding that instead of lottery millions going to opera houses and
other causes which they did not favour, it should be spent on new hospitals and
improving education” (Crickhowell 1997 p144)
In this
case the public were presented with two false choices;
iii) That between an opera house or other public
services and amenities and
iv) Choosing between an opera house or a new rugby
stadium
The first is a recurrent issue which concerns architectural
aspiration being weighed against wider social need and the question; “..what comfort is in an architect’s fame to
those who live in slums.” (Wilkinson 2014 p57). However, in this case such
comparisons were not invoked as regards the proposed investment in the stadium.
All that we might deduce in this instance is that in a popularity
contest the inevitable outcome will be that the more popular contestant will win.
However, there is the opportunity to consider both parts of the more
telling observation that;
“The greater the decrease in the social significance of an
art form, the sharper the distinction between criticism and enjoyment by the
public. The conventional is uncritically enjoyed, and the truly new is
criticized with aversion.” (Benjamin 1936
p26)
Rugby union football may be seen to have had greater social
significance than opera and the proposed new stadium was widely, and less
critically, welcomed. There is no small truth in Crickhowell’s comment that,
“.. those who had been so passionately
concerned about the design of an arts centre amid the new buildings arising in
Cardiff bay appeared to be entirely uninterested in the appearance of this
enormous structure in the very heart of the city. There was no anonymous
international competition to design the stadium, no public consultation and no
furore about the fanciful drawings of hideous structures that were unveiled at
the launch.” (Crickhowell
1997 pps 145-146)
There was also little public examination of the economic
case for the enlargement of the stadium to facilitate the hosting of the Rugby
World Cup and the perceived financial benefit to the city and region presented
by its promoters. In a paper which examined the true worth of hosting the RWC99
Calvin Jones concluded that there were considerable benefits for the region,
although many areas of potential benefit were not maximised. This was due in
large part to the structure of the bidding process and organisational
inadequacies, which in turn led to relatively low spectator spend and mixed
press coverage (Jones 2001).
Overall, however, the media debate favoured the Stadium
rather than the Opera House in terms of funding from a national source. The
latter offered an amenity which would attract visitors to Cardiff, some being
from outside Wales. Securing RWC99 through the redevelopment of the Stadium
would have ensured international tourism to Cardiff, Wales and the UK. In short
the Stadium, by the nature of the events held there, would have the broader
‘reach’ in event led tourism and leisure activity.
As to the longer term benefit claimed for the enlarged
stadium locally there was little countervailing assessment of;
-
potential negative impact on other commercial
activity in the city centre
-
where net profits from increased activity in
leisure, catering, tourism and other service activity would accrue
-
direct net costs to the city in security, crowd
and traffic management and cleaning
In that respect the Stadium project had a presumption in its
favour which was not extended to the Opera House and, in the absence of
effective opposition; claims made in support of that project went largely
unchallenged. It must be concluded that the Opera House would not have
matched the advantages afforded to the Stadium had there been a real direct contest for funding one or the other.
In the event the ‘contest’ initiated by the media was damaging to the Opera House project in accentuating the inherent weaknesses of that bid.
Outcomes
In 1995, the WRU won the right to host the 1999 Rugby World
Cup whilst some Millennium Commissioners were expressing doubts concerning the
business plan submitted by the Opera House Trust. There were four visits to Cardiff by
Millennium Commission representatives between June and August 1995 during which
time;
i)
controversy over the design of the opera house
continued and
ii)
media coverage of the ‘competition’ with the
Millennium Stadium project was pervasive
On the 20th December 1995 the Millennium Commission met and
rejected the Trust’s application for £50m to £60m funding. The Trust was
invited to submit a revised bid, which they considered, and there was a meeting
with the Millennium Commission in Cardiff to discuss the reasons for the
Commission’s rejection of the Business Plan. Controversy over the first design
continued until, in March 1996, Crickhowell was advised by Sir Geoffrey Inkin,
Chair of CBDC, that the Development Corporation had reached the conclusion that
the Zaha Hadid design should be set aside in view of;
a)
the high total cost,
b)
apparent lack of support from the public and
from the new Unitary Local Authority for Cardiff, and
c)
the absence of backing from the Millennium
Commission for the Business Plan and the scheme as it stood.
CBDC
therefore withdrew their support as the chances of those proposals succeeding
were extremely limited and felt a totally different approach was required.
The Institute of Welsh Affairs then convened a meeting of
the Chairs and Chief Executives of a number of key organisations at the
National Museum of Wales on 8 March 1996. Those present were unable to agree on
a way forward with the design and the vocal opposition of the then Leader of
the Local Authority, Russell Goodway was decisive. Reference is made to
Goodway’s rudeness to the representatives of the Welsh National Opera present
and quotes him as saying they should not be involved as ‘…after all, what’s WNO bringing to the table?’ (Talfan Davies 2008 p159). Matters were concluded when;
“Goodway’s provocative philistinism proved too much for
Crickhowell who stormed out, slamming half a ton of oak like a clap of thunder.”
(Talfan Davies 2008 p160)
Talfan Davies’ observation that Goodway stated that he not
been persuaded that there was proven need for a performing arts centre was
contradicted by the subsequent actions of the latter. When the original option for the Opera House site
expired the Local Authority stepped in and acquired it from ABP for £2.5m. The
decisive action secured the site for the Wales Millennium Centre which
succeeded in its application for funding from the Millennium Commission. It was
consistent with the assertion of the Leader that;
·
Crickhowell
was offered the Council’s support if the funding for the stadium could be
secured to facilitate RWC99.
·
Both projects could be secured for the City with
such support.
The Cardiff Bay Opera House Trust Board was disbanded in
1996 leaving a skeleton Board, to wind up the Trust.
Conclusions
The Assessment Panel appointed to advise the Cardiff Bay
Opera House Trust may be seen to have been vindicated in their selection of
Zaha Hadid by the subsequent acclaim of her work elsewhere. Had the Cardiff Bay
project been realised as the first of her major projects then the Trust would
have been internationally recognised as patrons. Their failure to secure the
necessary resources to advance and fully realise that aspiration can be attributed to leadership and organisation. That was clearly much weaker and less effective than that given by the local authority to the Stadium project. Even if the Stadium proposal had not emerged as a 'rival' bid wider confidence in the ability of the Trust to deliver the selected design had been seriously weakened.
A passing observation, made by a regional architect, was
that Hadid’s career might have been retarded if funding been approved but the
materials, finishes and other architectural details then compromised by a
parsimonious budget or cost over-runs. The publicity given to her treatment in
Cardiff might have been to her advantage in the longer term in that she was
lauded and supported by the architectural press and subsequently commissioned
to work in regimes less sensitive to public opinion in their architectural
patronage (Riach 2014, Wainwright 2014). Those commissioning such projects were better
equipped with the resources and powers to confer upon the designer the degree
of autonomy attributed to architectural patronage historically. At Cardiff
those who aspired to such patronage lacked autonomy, particularly in respect of
financial resources for which they were accountable to third parties and,
ultimately, wider society.
Public opinion was a contributory factor in these cases, the
polls conducted by the media evincing levels of popular support which suggested
a majority favoured the Stadium project. The vox populi, as represented by the
media served as a mandate for those in public office to direct resources to the
realisation of that objective and was an influential factor in securing the
necessary funding. The public debate triggered by the ‘contest’ thereby
contributed to the success of the stadium bid in that respect.
The extent to which it was a factor in the failure of the
opera house project is not, however, as is generally remembered and widely reported. The Opera House did not ‘lose a contest’ for
funding from the Millennium Commission between it and the Stadium. The very
real contest for wider support did, however, throw the Opera House bid into
relief and publicly revealed its shortcomings. In addition to having less
public support than the Stadium, the Trust’s bid was disadvantaged as regards
its resources in terms of finance, leadership and organisation.
The Opera House project displayed many of the
characteristics of patronage evidenced historically, being conceived and
promoted to fulfil a perceived cultural need, there being no permanent home for
the Welsh National Opera or major lyric theatre in Wales. The architect
selected, Zaha Hadid, had received few major commissions and therefore was
untested. In contrast, the
reconstruction of the National Stadium, long established as the home of Welsh
Rugby Union football could be considered the replacement of a commercial sports
facility of utilitarian purpose. The commissioning process was one of selecting
a designer of proven ability in that field and securing a fixed price contract
for its construction.
Both projects aspired to provide public amenity and appeal
to a national constituency. They also sought to complement strategies for
redefining the profile and external image of the city and region, nationally
and internationally. The Stadium was more successful in mobilising wider
support, and its wider social and cultural significance was an important element.
However the conclusion is that the decisive intervention, support and, above
all, leadership of the local authority was the more decisive factor.
As a speculative footnote it just remains to pose the ‘what
might have been?’ -
What if Zaha Hadid had been commissioned to design a stadium for
the Rugby World Cup 1999 by the Welsh Rugby Union ……………………………………………….????
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