Gibberd, Sir Frederick Ernest

Gibberd, Sir Frederick Ernest (1908–84). English architect, town-planner, and landscape-architect, one of the first in England to adhere to International Modernism after he met F. R. S. Yorke. He set up in practice in 1930, designing Pulman Court, Streatham, London (1934–6), a low-cost housing development which established his reputation. After the 1939–45 war, he designed (1949–51) the Lansbury Shopping Centre and Market, Poplar, London (curiously, even perversely, described as ‘dainty’ by Pevsner), in the style promoted at the South Bank Exhibition of the Festival of Britain (1951). He was also appointed (1946–72) Architect and Planner of Harlow New Town, Essex, 1972. Other buildings by him include Heathrow Airport, London (1950–69), Didcot Power Station, Berks. (1964–8), the Ulster Hospital, Belfast (1953–61), the RC Cathedral of Christ the King, Liverpool (1960–7), and Coutts Bank, The Strand, London (1966–75). His London Central Mosque, Regent's Park (1969–70), and the Inter-Continental Hotel, Hyde Park Corner, London (1968–75), like much of his work, would be difficult to regard as great architecture.

Bibliography

Kalman (1994);
Gibberd (1952, 1968, 1970, 1980);
Gibberd & and Yorke (1978)
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2004);