A tree house to treasure in 1:1 Architects Build Small Spaces

The pieces, though, are of varying interest. In some, there is a longing for profundity that has an emperor’s new clothes feeling about it. In others, there’s real delight and surprise.
My favourite piece is Norwegian architect Helen & Hard’s pavilion in the Madejski courtyard, which consists of willow trees cut in half supporting an arched roof of their thinned branches. It’s spooky but also beautiful.

If Helen & Hard’s pavilion plays knowingly on ideas of primitive construction, then Rintala Egertsson Architects’ Tower of Books at the National Art Library Staircase is a flaccid expression of Scandinavian cliché. The tower of softwood with small seats for reading (decorated with sheepskin) is pleasant enough, but calls to mind nothing more exciting than a Scandinavian summer house.

Worse is the clever-cleverness of Rural Studio’s Woodshed, which rips off (unacknowledged, as far as I can see) the great Swedish architect Sigurd Lewerentz’s flower shop at Malmo’s Eastern cemetery but is much less compelling as a form.

In the end, this is a fine show to visit — discovering the pavilions as you wander around the V&A is great. But the architects involved have responded rather predictably with self-absorbed and, for the most part, rather shallow reflections on what makes a refuge.
Until August 30. 020 7942.2000; www.vam.ac.uk

1:1 Architects Build Small Spaces
V&A
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