George Finch

George Finch (8 October 1930 – 13 February 2013) was a British architect. He was a committed socialist who believed architecture had the power to transform the lives of post-war Londoners. Finch's ideals drove his passion for designing social housing, civic and environmental buildings for everyday people built to the highest building standards.

Biography leftFinch was born in Tottenham, the son of a milkman. During WWII, he and his sister, Shirley, were evacuated to Saffron Walden, Essex, where he attended Newport Free Grammar School. Finch then studied architecture, at North London Polytechnic (now London Metropolitan University), moving in 1950 to the Architectural Association School of Architecture. He graduated in 1955 from a year that included Neave Brown, Kenneth Frampton, Patrick Hodgkinson, William Gillitt and Roy Stout.

Finch then joined the London County Council Architects Department, under Leslie Martin, where his designs exemplified Mixed Development – the dominant ideology for housing in the 1950s.

In his reworking of a scheme for Spring Walk, Stepney, he used space freed up at the base of the ten-storey blocks to build flats for the elderly and family houses. These were the earliest two-storey terraced houses to be built by the London County Council and were unique in central London at the time.

These were the days of Government insistence on industrialised system building. The absence of large vacant sites led Lambeth to adopt a policy of surgical interventions. Working under Hollamby, George Finch pioneered an architecture that created slim point blocks inserted on tight sites but always with communal provision at the base.

"In this way rather than just an exercise in building prefabricated dwellings we were able to expand the potential to include not only other dwelling types to suit different living styles (and remember these were all council dwellings at subsidised rents) but also various facilities that enriched the overall sense of community."

Later Work Finch left Lambeth when the Brixton Recreation Centre received planning and financial approval and, a keen thespian and set designer, he formed a partnership with theatre architect Roderick Ham. As a result of the 1970s recession, only the Derby Playhouse and Wolsey Theatre, in Ipswich, and work carried out to the Theatre Royal, York and Theatre Royal, Lincoln were realised, while later schemes including Westminster Pier and Riverside Studios in Fulham, developed in partnership with Will Alsop and John Lyall, proved abortive.

From 1973 until 1978 Finch was Head of Design in the School of Architecture at Thames Polytechnic (now Greenwich University). Later, joining Bob Giles' Architects Workshop, he was reunited with Ted Hollamby who by then had been appointed Chief Architect to the London Docklands Development Corporation. Hollamby commissioned Architects Workshop to produce a development plan for Canary Wharf. Their adopted plan followed a "remarkable" brief that allowed no buildings above 5 storeys. The marriage ended in separation and later divorce. In the late 60s he met Architect Kate Macintosh with whom he had a son Sean and remained until the end of his life.

Works Wates Blocks:- Building Design, September 1967 Utopia London, film. Lambeth Towers:- RIBA Journal July 1965, Utopia London, film. Brixton Recreation Centre:- Utopia London, film. www.brixtonblog.con/tag/brixton-recreation-centre Derby Playhouse:- Architectural Review October 1976. Chelsea Town Hall conversion:- Building, 1 August 1980 Park Community School:- Building sup. Refurbishment 10 May 1991