Art and Artifice Clash at Panmure Place Launch

There’s a joke amongst University of Edinburgh students that the best view of the city is from the top of Appleton Tower – because if you’re on top of it, at least you can’t see it. Much in the same way, in a room full of architects, a group of three men in conversation at the edge of Panmure Place’s launch event went completely unnoticed except by the keen eyes of Mike Pottinger-Glass, UNITE’s planning and design director. “You don’t often see three of Scotland’s leading young architects chatting together,” he said, adding that such a gathering would usually get the fists flying.

As lead designer on the project, one of the party, Professor Gordon Murray of Murray Dunlop Architects, had the honour of declaring the building open; his remarks made clear the levels of passion which could lead to blows over bricks and mortar. Harking back to Edinburgh's origins, Murray emphasized the challenge posed to new construction by the sense of age the city exudes – “the poet Coleridge,” we were told, “on arriving by carriage commented that the city looked to be hewn out of the rock on which it stood.”

There was every indication at the event that the architects took seriously the responsibility of building on what is a World Heritage site; not least since the firm were runners up in the competition to design “a rather well known... large building around the corner.” Murray was generous towards Enric Miralles’ controversial Scottish Parliament, saying that “the building at least seems to be performing well and serving its purpose.”

Yet for all the grand images of Edinburgh and its architecture, Murray appeared to be unable to escape the realities of the project. “Where student living meets friends in an urban lifestyle – well, at least that’s what it says on the tin.” Just add water and stir.

Panmure Place is, for all its frugal brilliance, a contrived space of “efficient, high quality residential units,” and Professor Murray is perhaps not wholly aware of the incompatibility of his vision with the economics of UNITE.