Chamberlin, Powell and Bon


Chamberlin, Powell and Bon was a British firm of architects whose work involved designing the Barbican Estate. They are considered one of the most important modernist architectural firms in post-war England.

Formation

The practice was founded in 1952 by Geoffry Powell, Peter "Joe" Chamberlin and Christoph Bon, following Powell's win in the 1951 architectural competition for the Golden Lane Estate. The three founding partners taught at Kingston Polytechnic when they each entered the design competition with the agreement that should any of them win they would form a partnership with the other two to deliver the project. The Golden Lane Estate is sometimes referred to as the apprentice piece of the practice and is important for its planned landscape which 'straddles the boundary between the picturesque and the formal'.
Charles Greenberg became an additional partner of the practice in 1960, although he chose not to add his name to the partnership for personal reasons. He was the only other partner working with CP&B on Barbican. Frank Woods also became an additional partner, and in 1985 the firm name became Chamberlin Powell Bon & Woods. The firm continued to 1989. Its records are archived at the Royal Institute of British Architects.

Main work

Following completion of the Golden Lane Estate, they won the commission to design and execute the adjacent Barbican development, also for the Corporation of the City of London, the wealthy municipal administration that has responsibility for the historic core of London, today its central financial district. The Barbican was such a large job they set up a sub-practice to deal with it: Chamberlin Powell and Bon Ltd. The firm was strongly influenced by the work and ideas of Swiss/French architect Le Corbusier, with the essence of the innovative design being encapsulated by the project architect Leopold Rubinstein who trained with Le Corbusier in Paris.
It is a measure of the importance of the practice in post-war British architecture that many of their works are now Listed Buildings.

List of works