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The Slate of Keswick: An Essay on (and Guide to) the Architecture of Cohesion

Part 2 Dissertation 2022
Adrian Finn
Arts University Bournemouth | UK
In late August of 2021 I toured the Lake District by motorbike. This essay offers a reflection on that tour and my encounter with the landscape and architecture of the region, with a focus on Keswick, a town famous for its use of locally sourced slate in the construction of its buildings. Drawing on my reading of John Ruskin (1819-1900), a native of the region, the essay explores critical and creative forms of writing, including fiction and poetry, to account for the cohesive nature of the built environment in the places I visited, arguing for a narrative and poetic understanding of the material from which Keswick is made: Honister Slate, or The Slate of Keswick. The essay concludes with a reflection on the nature of cohesion itself – how it stands in relation to the built environment of today – with a nervous apprehension for the future of residential and civic architecture across this country and the world.

Tutor(s)
Willem De Bruijn
2022
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