“Do you recognise these men?” (15 July, page 35). I certainly do.
This photo was taken in the office of Arup’s Structures Group 3 in Soho Square, London, in 1972. The three people are, from the left, Lennart Grut, Ted Happold and Peter Rice. They would have been meeting to discuss what at the time we called Beaubourg, but later became known as the Pompidou Centre in Paris. We won this in competition with little-known architects Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers, and, to the surprise of everyone, were then asked to get it built. At the time Structures 3 was run by Ted, with assistance from Peter, Gerry Clarke and Mike Barclay.
I was a grad +2 at the time, working in Structures 3 and, having done a stint in Africa, was transferred in 1974 to our Paris office, which was opened when we won the completion. Ted stayed in London until he left to form Buro Happold, taking half of Structures 3 with him. Gerry Clarke went to Paris to manage the office, and Peter commuted on a weekly basis. Lennart ran the structural team that designed Pompidou, and several other projects including a factory
for IBM in Bordeaux, which I worked on. Lennart is Danish, but his English was so perfect you wouldn’t have known it, and he was also able to converse easily in French and German. The need for French was obvious, but the contractor for the main frame was Krupp Steel, and Lennart’s German came in handy in dealing with them. Krupp had the most superb mobile crane I have ever seen, and the driver used to arrive on site in a Porsche. The highlight of the construction was delivery of the first main truss, which had to come into Paris at about 2am, and we all had a party on site.
Hope that's enough. If it is it will be the first time I have ever won anything.
Postscript
Dave Beattie, director, Arup
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