THE FUN PALACE BUSINESS PLAN FC UNIT15

THE FUN PALACE BUSINESS PLAN FC UNIT15

Littlewood (1964) imagined a not so distant future (within 20 years) in which the blue and white collar workers would be free to live as only a privileged minority then could; choosing when what to do for work and leisure, while Price (1968) ar-gued that the work/leisure dichot-omy was already redundant and the increasing wealth and freedom of individuals demanded an urban environment of greater flexibility than currently provided in order to meet the unforeseen demands of an increasingly dynamic peo-ple. Drawing on pleasure gardens (Duffy), The Fun Palace was thus to be ‘a university of the streets… a laboratory of pleasure’ (Littlewood, 1964), a flexible and adaptable ‘short-life toy of dimensions and organizations’ (Price, 1968).

The influential, almost built, Fun Palace was conceived by Theatre director Joan Littlewood. The Ar-chitect was Cedric Price. The proj-ect team notably included Gordon Pask, a cybernetician heading the palace’s Cybernetics Subcommittee (Mathews) who promoted archi-tecture as systems design; adapt-able and potentially smart systems (Pask).

Architecture case study: The Fun Palace2/A

The Fun Palace was a ‘kit of parts… of service towers, lifting gantries and building components… solely to produce the kind of interior environments that are necessary and fitting to whatever is going on’ (Banham p107). Littlewood emphasised its informality and impermanence (it was to last 10 years) and compared the palace to a park for its public inclusiveness and freedom; ‘The whole plan is open, but on many levels. So the greatest pleasure of traditional parks is preserved – the pleasure of strolling casually, looking in at one another of these areas or (if this is preferred) settling down for several hours of work-play’. Such areas included a ‘fun arcade’, music area for experimentation, jamming, dancing, recording, a ‘science playground’ which ‘by night… will become an agora or kaffeeklatch where the Socrates, the Abelards, the Mermaid poets, the wandering scholars of the future, the mystics, the sceptics and the sophists can dispute till dawn’ (1964,68). Major themes for activities determined by various committee meetings and public discourse included; Acting as critics, role playing, business games, two-way panto and mystery cult (Lewis). Price (1984) noted that although many of the planned amenities and activities may already be available to a metropolitan public; ‘their inter-accessibil-ity achieved by juxtaposition not only enhances freedom of choice, but also creates new activities, at present without name’. Source: Pollard, R.

Perspective sketch for the Fun Palace. Source: Price, C.

THE FUN PALACE BUSINESS PLAN FC UNIT15

As the palace was open on many levels, so was it experimental; as well as being a ‘laboratory of fun’ (littlewood 1964) it would be a laboratory of architecture, ‘itself expendable and change-able’, in a constant state assembly and disassembly; many materials, equipment and construction techniques would be tested within its structural framework. Unconventional methods included warm-air curtains, fog-dispersal plant and charged static-vapour zones (Price, 1964). On site at Mill Meads on the Lea River in East London, the Palace was highly integrated with its surround-ings; exploiting the industrial part-derelict landscape for its open approaches and sculptural qualities (Price, 1984). The framework of the palace consisted of fourteen bays, that is seven pairs of bays; each pair of bays defined by fourteen towers that supported the lateral grid and mem-brane roof with retractable curtains, above this the single gantry crane of constant operation - one Gordon Pask’s contributions; an improvement on the original two cranes proposed by Price and engineer Newby (Price, 2001). The kit of parts would assemble enclosures of two types: small intensively serviced cells such as kitchens, workshops and lavatories; and large lesser serviced volumes such as cinema and meeting halls. Save for the three dimensional escape grid, all pub-lic routes connecting such spaces above the unobstructed ground plane were fully adjustable (Price, 1984).

According to Mathews (2007), Pask’s particularly productive cybernetic subcommittee became increasing influential, above other subcommit-tees formed by the various consultants involved; the central concept of the palace gradually shifted from theatre to cybernetics. The palace would operate on a feedback system: harvesting data from sensors which would identify user trends and preferences the IMB 360-30 com-puter would process this information to manipulate parameters set for the spatial orders and activities. The idea was that the palace would learn user behaviour patterns by processing accumulated data with algo-rithms and using probabilities plan for future use, automatically and op-timally composing space, mood and activity. Roy Ascott, the later tech-noetic artist, working in the cybernetic subcommittee proposed a ‘Pillar of Information’ located at the main entry which was essentially a public computer acting to record, store and make accessible through various modes all the happenings and information the ‘memory’ of the palace (Ascott p148-9).

Fun Palace: perspective for the Lea River site on photomontage Source: Price, C

“Organisational Plan as Programme”, from the minutes of the Fun Palace cybernetics committee

meeting, 27th January 1965 Source: Pask, G

Fun Palace. Source: Price, C. & Pask, G.

THE FUN PALACE BUSINESS PLAN FC UNIT15

Chapter 2 Bibliography

Ascott, R. (2003) Telematic Embrace: Visionary Theories of Art, Technology, and Consciousness. London, Universi-ty of California Press.

Banham, R. (1996) Peoples Palaces. In: Banham, M., et al., A Critic Writes, Essays by Reyner Banham. London, Uni-versity of California Press, pp. 103-108.

Duffy, S. (2013) Celebrating Joan Littlewood: it’s time to build her fun palaces, the guardian. 18 Sept. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/stage/theatreblog/2013/sep/18/theatre-joan-littlewood-culture-fun-palaces [Accessed Jan 2017]

Gullström, C. (2014) Furnishing the Fun Palace – with new digital design materials. Proceedings from What the matter? Materiality and Materialism at the Age of Computation, International Conference, ENHSA, Barcelona, September 4-5-6, 2014, pp. 228-24. Available at: http://kth.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:808635/FULL-TEXT01.pdf [Accessed Dec 2016]

Haque, U. (2007) The Architectural Relevance of Gordan Pask, Architectural Design. 77 (4), 54-61.

Lewis, B. (1965) Fun Palace: Counter-Blast to Boredom, New Society. 15 April 1965, p.8-10

Littlewood, J. & Price, C. (1964) A Laboratory of Fun New Scientist, 14 May vol. 391, p432-433. Available at: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=BJ5ky1xkD68C&printsec=frontcover&hl=EN&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&-cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false [Accessed Dec 2016]

Mathews, S. (2006) The Fun Palace as Virtual Architecture, Journal of Architectural Education. 59 (3), 39-48. Avail-able at DOI: 10.1111/j.1531-314X.2006.00032.x [Accessed Nov 2016]

Pask, G. (1965). “Organisational Plan as Programme”, from the minutes of the Fun Palace cybernetics committee meeting, 27th January 1965 [image] Available at: http://www.cca.qc.ca[Accessed Jan 2017].

Pask, G. (1969) The Architectural Relevance of Cybernetics, Architectural Design 39, 494-496. Available at: http://workgroups.clemson.edu/AAH0503_ANIMATED_ARCH/879Readings/GordonPask_Architectural%20Rele-vance%20of%20Cybernetics.pdf [Accessed Dec 2016]

Pollard, R. (1785). Vauxhall Gardens [image] Available at: http://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/360374 [Accessed Jan 2017].

Price, C. & Pask, G. (1965?). The Fun Palace [image] Available at: http://i2.wp.com/www.interactivearchitecture.org//wp-content/uploads/2005/10/cedric-price-paskplanas.jpg [Accessed Jan 2017].

Price, C. (1961-65). Fun Palace: perspective for the Lea River site on photomontage [image] Available at: http://www.cca.qc.ca [Accessed Jan 2017].

Price, C. (1963). Fun Palace: perspective sketch of a junction [image] Available at: http://www.cca.qc.ca[Accessed Jan 2017].

Price, C. (1963). Perspective sketch for the Fun Palace [image] Available at: http://www.cca.qc.ca [Accessed Jan 2017].

Price, C. (2001) Gorden Pask, Kybernetes. 30 (5/6), 819-820. Available at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/03684920110392084 [Accessed December 2016].

Price, C. (1984) Cedric Price, E G Bond Ltd, London.

Despite Littlewood later enrolling a star-studded cast for its board of trustees to help support the cause, Buckminster Fuller, The Earl of Harewood, Lord Ritchie Calder and Yehudi Menuhin; the project failed to be realised. The causes of why it failed: Planning and funding, fund-ing because it relied heavily pri-vate donations and subsidization by institutions (Arts Council) that could make arbitrary judgments regarding its merits (Holdsworth); it was not financially sustainable. Nevertheless, the Fun Place was incredibly influential in the realms of architecture and theatre, and so remains today. Although architec-ture that may credit the Fun Palace today might only draw a superficial stylization, the cybernetic func-tionality of the building was pre-scient beyond todays actual smart city/building trend. To paraphrase the international Fun Palace Cam-paign; the idea of a space welcom-ing and open to all, bring arts and sciences together, where everyone is an artist and everyone is a scien-tist, remains a great idea (funpalac-es.co.uk).

TIMELINE

1961-63: Concept, Design, Pro-gram.

1962-64: Feasibility Studies.

1964: Included in Civic Trust’s Lea Valley Development Plan.

1966: Fun Palace Foundation reg-istered as Charitable Trust.

1966: Withdrawn from Lea Valley site ‘due to strongly contested variation in the extent of particular site’ (Price, 1968).

Fun Palace: perspective sketch of a junction. Source: Price, C