New talk Brilliantly Brutal to look at Preston Bus Station

Preston Bus Station at night Pic: Tony Worrall — The talk by Michael Akers will ask ‘what on earth’ inspired the local architects who designed the Bus Station Pic: Tony Worrall

A new talk titled Brilliantly Brutal will take a look at Preston Bus Station.

Michael Akers will discuss the love/hate fascination with the 1960s brutalist building at the event on Monday 6 November.

A spokesperson for organisers Preston Historical Society said: “For decades derided as an oversized, bleak, and largely redundant concrete monstrosity, in equal measure it has been lauded by art critics as ambitious, innovative and exciting. Threatened with destruction, instead Preston bus station now basks in a growing national reputation, esteemed in various publications and media outlets as a bold 1960s statement of the ideals post war Modernism, and now a beacon of urban regeneration. Can this be true, of a bus station?

“Utopian or dystopian, love it, or hate it, it’s definitely time to take another look at this intriguing building. How did a small northern town come to be home to such a unique behemoth of a bus station and car park? What on earth inspired the local architects who designed it? What is Brutalism? By what twists of fate did it go from almost inevitable demolition to listed building status and award winning restoration? Can even concrete be beautiful?

“Perhaps if we can place our brilliantly Brutal Bus Station in the context in which it was first created, we’ll even see it as a tangible representation of a dream to create a more egalitarian society and to make our lives more fulfilled through good design. Then again, we might not.”