Delayed effects

After all the pessimism of the doom scenarios, which were sometimes spelt out with ill-concealed delight (as if it were a horror or disaster movie), and after the misplaced optimism that a crisis such as this would be a perfect opportunity to make a clean sweep and henceforth do things differently and better, a new mood is in the ascendent: a return to the business as usual.

The fact that some of the banks that were kept afloat with government subsidies are already making fat profits again – and once again handing out those accursed, equally fat bonuses – would appear to be an illustration of this. In fact business is not functioning as usual, or likely to do so for a good while yet, but it is obviously going to take some time for this to sink in. The idea that the world will never again be the way it was before the start of the financial crisis has not yet penetrated the collective consciousness, which is still attuned to pre-crisis conditions.

One explanation for this is that everything around us continues to radiate that pre-crisis era, including architecture. The malaise is thus still largely invisible. The only visible signs are the deserted construction sites, the vacant retail premises, and the growing number of houses displaying For Sale or To Rent signs. Even in a magazine like A10 the crisis is not really evident. The recently finished works we are now featuring were designed and developed in the pre-crisis years, under favourable conditions. The reality – that architects are currently being confronted with the crisis in the form of postponed and cancelled commissions and a lack of new work – is not apparent in the pages of this magazine. The far-reaching consequences of this malaise will continue to make themselves felt in the coming years, first in construction practice and then, inevitably, in all the architecture books and magazines – because there will be less to publish, and because what there is will undoubtedly be more restrained and less lavish than was the case in the recent past.