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 | | |  | | |  | | | | | | Name:
N Fagan
Building:
The Tricorn
Location:
Portsmouth
What is your relationship to this building?:
User
Why do you love this building?:
I love it's shape and original potential, held back by the council running out of money and failing to clad it in ceramic tiles as originally designed, then further deteroiation promoted by lack of will. It was once a great building, now sadly ridiculed as a carbuncle by the unknowing masses.
Read also this review of the Tricorn from Gez, on the BBC H2G2 website: http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/alabaster/A113167
For further information and photographs of the Tricorn, which was closed in March 2002, visit this website: www.rmaz.co.uk/tricorn.html
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Name:
Simon Newsham
Your comments on this building:
I moved to Portsmouth in 1976, and my first sighting of this hideous building made me wonder how such a monstrosity ever got planning permission. It is an ugly unfunctional creation. Dark grey concrete, it has a sinister air about it and it seems to be permanently wet, not damp but wet - even in that fabulous summer of '76. It is certainly a scary experience if one ever parks there and descends the graffti-daubed stairways. The elevators never arrive when summoned - a good job too because they reeked of urine anyway. In its time, the Tricorn was a glimpse of what the future could look like. Give me the past anyday.
Name:
Scott Duncan
Your comments on this building:
I was born in Portsmouth, and to anyone of my generation who knows that building the only thing to o with it is demolish it. I am not one of the uncultured masses but an intelligent and passionate human being. The Tricorn is a waste of space and only exists as a monument to bad design and build. As a previous eviewer states, it is permanently wet and has an air of decay and urban violence. End its and our misery now, please.
Name:
Claire Bowles
Your comments on this building:
I hate the Tricorn Centre. It is like a ghost town to me. Grafftti, vandalism, mould and violence. When you walk through that building there is fear that the worst is lurking in there. Get rid of it now, not in the future. Many people have jumped off that building, so it is not just an eyesore but also a health risk.
Name:
Stan Shepherd
Your comments on this building:
I can't believe the attitude that people have towards this amazing building. All it needs is white tiles and some money spent on it and it would be a wonderful thing. Look at the shape, for goodness sake! How many dull square blocks get built all the time? Most of the time I think us Brits prefer things you just don't notice. I think the attitude of the British public towards anything different has always been predictably negative and naive. This is why, statistically, Rolf Harris is the most popular artist in Britain.
Name:
Jay
Your comments on this building:
If you put white tiles all over it that would look a mess... I'm 19 now and when I was 12 I was beaten up there and left for about 3 hours before anyone found me so you really think a building where this can happen should stay?
Name:
Agitator
Your comments on this building:
By far the most interesting structure to grace the (ungrateful) face of Portsmouth, the city turned its back on its style of brutalism in favour of (for example) hugely offensive flat blocks easily seen when approaching the city. It's a shame that it wasn't given the chance it deserved, especially as the city already has it's fair share of absolute monstrosities. It is worth mentioning Centros Miller, the current holders of the site, and their woeful pretence that they have any formal plans for the site, as well as the local ‘popular’ press and the shameless bandwagon-jumping and p*sspoor journalism that has become the norm when addressing the matter. Indeed, Portsmouth doesn’t deserve the Tricorn, and anyone with an eye for interesting architecture with a massive potential, or simply anyone with an open mind (both short on the ground in Portsmouth, I’m afraid) can see the situation for what it is: Situating the Tricorn in Portsmouth is like giving Michaelangelo’s David to a Chimp and telling him to look after it.
Name:
Chris New
Your comments on this building:
I have lived in Portsmouth for my whole life and as a local artist have drawn many aspects of the tricorn center and have produced many pieces on this beautiful building. I was also there on the day that they started to knock it down and my friend was one of the so called nutters who went in and managed to stop them for a while. I am sad to see it go and feel that we will regret it in years to come if only the council stopped and though about it more.
Name:simon newsham
Your comments on this building:
Hey come on Stan and the others, just admit it, it was a brave design but the wrong materials were used. This resulted in the grey damp monstrosity we are so gladly dismantling now. I read somewhere that it should have been clad in mosaic tiles, and the only reason is wasn't was that Portsmouth City Council wouldn't stump up the cash. Hmm?!! that Gateshead carpark twin of the Tricorn doesn't have any mosaic tiles on it, it looked the image of the Tricorn, in fact people have said to me "that film wiv Michael Caine? Get Carter? that woz filmed in Pompey wernt it?" Oh and the demolition has been set back by the finding of 15cm depth of bird excrement. Nice. Ilook at the original plans and I think how did it go so wrong?
Name:Kevin Edwards
Your comments on this building:
Yes I and many others have been defeated in trying to save the Tricorn. Watching the braying cheers, as the concrete crusher set about its task, it seemed strangely Orwellian, directly out of Animal Farm. Can the people of Portsmouth not think for themselves, do they have to follow every word of the Napolean AKA the City Fathers? Devoid of any vision they never wanted it to work (as seemingly they now don't want the Millennium Tower to succeed some 40 years later either). So they starve it of funding, embroil it in controversy and sow a negative feeling of distrust in the project so that when it does fail, they are correct in their judgement, clever authors of their own destiny.
When I do get to write on the renaissance of Portsmouth it will be pitched in monosyllables so that these City Fathers will be able to understand it and relate it to their loyal subjects. Wake up People of Portsmouth, just because you once lived in a military town, today you no longer have to follow, you are now allowed to think for yourself! Just because the City Leaders are devoid of vision why should you be so condemned?
The Government and its development agency (SEEDA) are committed to a policy of sustainability. Considering that aspects of this building could have been retained and crafted into a new and exciting centre, I question if they really understand the term?
Heavens Light our Guide is the motto of Portsmouth, I believe there have been some dark and cloudy nights over Portsmouth in the past few years.
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