Book Review:

The Concise Townscape by Gordon Cullen

Submitted by: Devyani Totla

Subject:T & M UD
Book Review: The Concise Townscape
INTRODUCTION
The book “The Concise Townscape” is written by Gordon Cullen. Gordon Cullen (1914-
1994) was an English architect,an urban designer who carried on the Townscape
movement . He had played a major role in structuring townscape through this book. First
edition of book was first published in 1961.

According to Gordon Cullen Townscape is a visual art contained in the arrangement of

buildings, roads, trees, nature and urban environment that decorate the space.

SUMMARY
In the reading, Gordon Cullen defined urban design as The Art of Relationship. The goal of
urban planning was to manipulate groups of buildings and physical town elements so as to
achieve visual impact and drama. In other words, cities should be designed from the point of
view of the moving person.

Gordon’s views contributed to using townscape as an approach to an urban design

philosophy. The term townscape has since become associated with a variety of concerns in
environmental design ranging from the development of design guides for residential areas
to the conservation of pre-industrial towns. Moreover, this book is presented with good
physical design applications of some aspects of human needs in the visual environment
which are being identified by more scientific research in environmental psychology. The
author believed that urban design not only concerned about relationship between buildings
but also the interaction between people and urban space.

This is a wonderful description of the components that make cities and towns work, from a
point of view that celebrates urban life rather than fears it.

Gordon Cullen describes three primary ways in which our environment produces an
emotional reaction key to the planner or architect:

1) OPTICS : It is how we look at the environment around us. He says that when the
pedestrian walks through the town at an uniform speed,the scenery of the town is
often revealed in a series of jerks and revelations.He called this “SERIAL VISION”. It
can also be explained as the images captured by an observer while walking from one
place to another in a region. He wrote that a town comes alive through the drama of
juxtaposition.
 2) PLACE: It is the reaction to the position of our body in its environment. For example,
a man on the edge of the cliff will have a very lively sense of position. Whereas, the
man at the end of a deep cave will react to the fact of the enclosure.

3) CONTENT: It is about the fabric of the towns: colour , texture, scale, style, character,
personality and uniqueness. In old towns, the fabric will show the evidence of
differing periods. The content depends on two factors- The level of conformity and
the level of creativity.

An urban environment is composed by two ways. The first, the city as an object composed
of outside planners as subjects. Secondly the city that are constructed and then filled up by
activities. Both are a complementary continuity. Townscape role here is as a city forming the
structure and support the human activity. Urban arrangement should be able to provide
comfort to the people who occupy it. Urban environment influenced the development of
society psychologically and physically.

In essence the urban townscape is divided into a series of elements those are important in
the urban design. With the townscape, people can recognize an area both physically and
emotionally.

The book has had a major influence on Architects, planners and others concerned with
what the cities should look like.