Once upon a time I found myself in a very small waiting room in St James’s Palace, furnished like a posh-but-thrifty dentist’s with old Sotheby’s catalogues and ancient copies of Country Life, the sound of clock bells and tramping guardsmen percolating from outside. I was ushered into a large room, to be grilled by associates of the then Prince of Wales as to my suitability to be his architectural adviser. Where did I live? Stoke Newington (wrong answer). Would I do other work to supplement the tiny pay I would receive for a supposedly part-time position. Yes (wrong answer). Could I type?
I made it onto a shortlist of two, but the job went to the other candidate. This was a bullet dodged – I would not have thrived in the scheming world of the prince’s architectural court – but it’s fair to ask why I accepted the invitation to apply in the first place. I did not, after all, share his taste for clumsy traditionalist architecture. Because, I naively told my 25-year-old self, the prince had some good instincts: he wanted beautiful new buildings and urban spaces, as did I. We only disagreed on the means. Perhaps, if I got the job, I could educate him towards more intelligent approaches.
