Kate Little, erstwhile Head of Planning, made no secret of her wish to encourage developers to ignore town design statements and conservation areas in order to increase the stock of iconic contemporary buildings in East Devon. It was a manifestation of the extraordinary power that unelected officials have to change our landscape.

But this policy is not without dangers. There is always the risk that the aesthetics of contrasting styles won’t work when juxtaposed in a real setting rather than on the drawing board, though by the time you discover this it’s too late. There is also the risk that revolutionary, unconventional, structures won’t stand up to the elements as well as those which incorporate evolutionary development of tried and tested techniques. The Basil Spence tower at Exeter University is a local example of a problem iconic building and more recently Lloyds of London have let it be known that they are looking to vacate the Richard Rogers iconic building sometimes known as the “inside out building”, grade I listed in 2011, because the maintenance costs are too high. The Exmouth Bowling Alley has not been without structural problems either.

Spare a thought then for this domestic example, as described in a design and access statement recently posted on the EDDC planning portal (14/1494/FUL).
“……………An inherent feature of the design as an appropriate response to the site and context is extensive glazing to the seaward south facing elevation. Whilst this has proved highly successful in delivering both the intended visual impact of the design and internal experiential qualities, our clients were shocked to experience during the exceptional weather conditions which occurred over the past winter an unanticipated phenomenon which resulted in relatively significant damage to the glazing.

This concerns an action whereby small pebble-like material bedded within the adjacent cliff top becomes exposed by persistent heavy rain and is then transported by strong winds directly towards the seaward face of the building. The relatively flat open area between the cliff-top and the house allows considerable wind driven acceleration of such stone particles which then impact upon the glazing with significant force, sufficient to shatter the toughened glass panes of double glazed units. In one instance, a piece of material actually became embedded within the cavity of a double glazed unit.

The first instance of this action occurred over night and, our clients recount, was actually quite terrifying to experience, the impression being of the glazing apparently imploding. This phenomenon had certainly not been foreseen at design stage and neither had any immediately neighboring owners anecdotally drawn our clients’ attention to such a problem existing in this location although it now seems other property owners have previously experienced similar instances of damage.

Although this past winter’s weather may still currently be deemed exceptional, it is increasingly likely that such conditions will occur more frequently in the future. To date, damage has been caused to several different areas of the glazing on the affected elevation inflicted during several separate episodes of the action occurring and our clients have incurred relatively significant expense in repairing the damage.

It is against this background that a potential solution to permanently protect the building has been sought given it is beyond doubt the same circumstances will occur under future storm conditions……”
The proposed solution involves adding solid glass wind screens for winter storms (maybe it was a mistake to clear the vegetative shelter belt to improve the view) and brise-soleil devices to offset another problem: solar heating in summer.

Large panes of glass, high speed, corrosive (salt), wind vortices and pebbles from the cliff edge site, strong sunshine – What could possibly go wrong?

Remedies sound expensive – let’s hope they work.