Christopher Woodward, Architect , Central Milton Keynes

Christopher was born in Southsea, Hants. At grammar school he studied science subjects and his idea of being an architect emerged quite late in his school days. He says: ‘the school library…had a copy of Le Corbusier’s book, The Modular, which struck a chord with me’. The local authority agreed to fund him to study at the Architectural Association (AA), from 1957 to 1962. He explains how that the courses were taught by people about 10 years older than him, such as James Gowan, Allan Colqhoun, and Peter Smithson. Students worked in open studios and were encouraged to be innovative and explore modern architecture. On graduation, he and several others were hired to work on the report ‘Traffic in Towns’ prepared by Professor Colin Buchanan for the Ministry of Transport. The report considered how to adapt towns to make them more accessible to cars. They worked on the area bounded by Tottenham Court Road, Great Portland Street, Oxford Street and Euston Road. The Minister of Transport who commissioned the report was fired about a week after it was published, but: ‘It was experience and gave me some sort of slight qualification to talk about urban motorways’. He moved briefly to Lyons, Israel and Ellis: ‘as a finishing school to become a real architect’. He was then invited to join Smithsons to work on the Economist building; working there for seven years was, he says: ‘a wonderful apprenticeship’. But by about 1971 he had little work; and whilst working on making a model for an exhibition at the Hayward Gallery, he & others were approached by Derek Walker, with an invitation to consider coming to Milton Keynes.