The Tricorn Centre
Portsmouth, UK

1966 – 2004

The Tricorn Centre could be dark and foreboding but for us
it was a landscape full of warmth and possibility. Built in Portsmouth in 1966 this multi-purpose shopping centre was
a classic example of Brutalist architecture. Despite initial
praise for its ‘exciting visual composition*’, by1968 it was
voted Britain’s 4th ugliest building.

It was already largely evacuated in the late nineties when
we began to explore its vast expanses of ultra-smooth
tarmac, its painted curbs and loading bays. We were fascinated by its myriad bizarre shapes, it was somewhere for us to roam freely amongst sprawling concrete geometries.

Set against the backdrop of the practical and historical commonplace architecture of a coastal city it was a revelation. Sometimes in the south coast sunlight you could squint and conjure up a vista of orange Tunisian baked sand out of its curves and angles. Had George Lucas ever visited the place he might have saved a lot of money and shot the whole of Star Wars there. Perhaps it was too mad and wonderful even for that.

It struggled to survive from the outset due to a lack
of foresight by the town planners and a subsequent
reticence of big business to get involved. Only half fulfilling
it’s potential, over the years the building fell into disrepair
and neglect, by the late 90s only a handful of budget shops remained.

That such a complex structure was ever built is testament
to the freedom and vision of the era in which it was conceived. Today such a project would most likely be subject to so much commercial and political restraint that it would never make it to the drawing board let alone off it.

The Tricorn Centre was something that shouldn’t exist,
a place that couldn’t possibly thrive. It is largely thought to
have been a failure, but was that a failure to embrace the absurd, the different?

Although plans were drawn up to reanimate its cold, neglected hulk it was eventually torn down in 2004.

This board is our tribute to that “romantic piece of concrete sculpture**” and a reminder of a time when the possibilities
for the shapes and surfaces we live amongst were unshackled.
*Civic Trust
**Daniel Liebeskind