All articles by Marcus Fairs – Page 6
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Features
Zaha's park-and-ride
This mundane suburban transport interchange in Strasbourg dissolves the distinction between art and architecture. Marcus Fairs discovers Zaha Hadid's latest creation.
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Features
Wise, after the event
Chris Wise was Arup's star engineer when he came up with the design of the Millennium Bridge. He didn't foresee the wobble at the time, but if he had, he would have gone ahead anyway.
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Features
Smells like team spirit
They're troubleshooters who go into a project early, build up a team, break down barriers and resolve conflicting agendas. Welcome to the exciting yet non-adversarial world of the facilitator.
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Features
End of term report
Is construction a better place since New Labour came to power? Will it deliver on its promises in its seemingly inevitable second term? Marcus Fairs asks industry leaders how they'd grade the government's performance …
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Features
Image is everything
If your flagship project goes horribly wrong and the press are baying for blood, don't just stop answering the phone. You need a PR who can spin your company from disaster to triumph.
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Features
Safety match
The unions' drive to improve site safety is putting them into a privileged position with the government's top decision-makers. This growth in their political clout has far-reaching implications for all sides of industry.
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Features
When all the cows have gone
The rural economy faces collapse in the wake of foot and mouth. Meanwhile, our booming cities are ever more choked for space. It's time to reopen the debate about building on the green belt, argues Marcus Fairs
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Features
MIPIM uncovered
As stock markets nosedived last Thursday, the 17,000 alcohol-assisted attendees of the MIPIM property fair networked like there was no tomorrow. Marcus Fairs and Gordon Jon Thompson spent 24 hours at the champagne apocalypse
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News
Square Mile set to become 'mini-Manhattan'
Five mega-towers to get the go-ahead in the City as Corporation chief calls for more tall buildings.
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Features
How to survive MIPIM
Heading off to Cannes next week for the MIPIM property fair? If you want to keep your cred and be seen at all the coolest hang-outs, you'd better read this first
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Features
Brand new sports kit
At last, a solution to poorly designed lottery-funded leisure facilities – an off-the-peg sports hall that's cheap and cheerful
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Features
Is prefab just a fad?
Last year, some housebuilders came to the conclusion that prefab was the future and started gearing up to meet it. Now many of the claims for factory housing are looking increasingly shaky.
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News
Sport England to offer £300 sports centre designs
Off-the-peg detailed designs are being offered by quango to boost quality of sports architecture.
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Features
12 steps to a safer industry
Next week the construction industry will present its ideas for reducing site accidents to the safety summit demanded by John Prescott. In preparation, Building invited seven people with extensive site experience to our own mini-summit to find out what they are doing to improve safety – and what more could ...
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Features
Designers in the safety spotlight
In the third of our series in the run-up to John Prescott's safety summit, Building asks if safety is a matter of design, and if designers are doing enough to combat site deaths.
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Features
Miralles' last laugh
Part imaginative conservation project, part crazy new build, Utrecht town hall is a fitting tribute to its late architect.
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News
New body set to harness Egan to public design
CABE and M4I to create new body as Building for the Future conference debates better public architecture.
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Features
Kapoor and McAslan's art pavilion trumpets Sally Army
This collaboration between artist and architect will provide London with a new Thames-side landmark.
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News
Four fight it out in housing shake-up
Bryant and Beazer merger thrown into confusion as Taywood and Persimmon bid for players.
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Features
The clean machine
The fuel cell is a reliable, sustainable and efficient source of energy. So far, it hasn't been economically viable, but a project in Surrey suggests things may be about to change.