![]() ![]() Think of Doha or Abu Dhabi, each using the architecture of the spectacular to construct an image of themselves as cities of culture. Both these buildings mixed a cocktail of culture and architecture to reposition their host cities on the international stage. It was compared to an oil rig and a refinery, but it was the gap between the building’s appearance and its function as a museum, that made it an instant icon. But the Pompidou, designed by Richard Rogers and Renzo Piano (which opened in 1977), kicked the city into the contemporary age, transforming a moribund historic core into a place of possibilities. Paris already had a useless tourist monument and instant logo in the Eiffel Tower. While the Sydney Opera House was being built, the Centre Pompidou was also under construction. It was probably the first example of a billowing, vaguely nautical architecture, which recalled sails or waves through a formal language that had really very little to do with what went on inside. In a Sydney where the landmarks were leftovers of the colonial period, built with British steel, the Opera House by Jørn Utzon (completed 1973) was a statement that the city had arrived on the global scene. Bilbao wasn’t the first city to be transformed by a self-consciously iconic building and it won’t be the last. You could just as well call it the Sydney Opera House effect, the Pompidou effect, or dozens of other effects. The thing about the Bilbao effect is that it is a myth. Frank Gehry’s building has been much praised, but how has the museum really changed the area and are there too many cities trying to copy its example?Īrchitecture and design critic of the Financial Times ![]() ![]() It is 20 years since the Guggenheim Bilbao opened. ![]()
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