FOREWORD by Richard Haslam
A centenary is a fine cause for celebration. Clough’s many friends were so disappointed that he did not quite reach his own. But here we are, gathered in his home environment for the centenary of his now famous creation. In this vein I remember two great parties given here at Portmeirion long ago by his heirs, bustling with colleagues and friends – an 80th maybe, and a fireworks set-piece for his knighthood. For a business to live on after its founder is rare enough, but for an architectural business like Portmeirion’s to flourish against every current is astonishing. Is it simplistic to suggest that to a great measure Clough’s home landscapes made him, both the coastal intricacies he developed at Portmeirion and the noble garden he made at his home at Plas Brondanw? I recall seeing early, undated ink doodles of his neighbouring shores and coves, alive with Mediterranean nautical imagery, wind gods etc and their heroic Welsh mountain backdrop; these point to the stroke of genius in the placename he invented for his village. ‘Portmeirion’ brings Wales and Italy together, but more than that it conveys to the public an idea or sense of civilisation. This was not lost on the village’s early clientele even if the precise interpretation was elusive. Indeed, Clough traded on its obscurity, admitting in an early advertisement that the place is hard to find and beset by rainy weather. But the founding formula was quite simple – combining the characteristics of its maker, ‘architect and publican’ as his self-identification has it.
PORTMEIRION: THE ARCHITECTURE OF PLEASURE
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This appeal to a tradition of hospitality, conscious or otherwise, could echo the legendary banquets of the medieval princes of Wales. It worked because – after Jim Wyllie was swiftly installed - the catering was first-class. That holidaymakers and artisans fell for this vision shows the reliance of all concerned on both luck and good judgment in finding a start of his village experiment in the Portmeirion peninsula close to his own home. Clough’s ambitions were wider than this, however. He saw his resort village as a vehicle not just for the good of his part of North Wales, but as propaganda for the nation’s architecture and planning. These causes were often seen as naif, over-ambitious and less than persuasive - visionary certainly but in the twentieth century context unprofessional. So, his work as Portmeirion’s architect often fell on deaf ears. What has proved of lasting value is his appeal for consideration of the environment, and especially in his polemic ‘England and the Octopus’ (1928, reprinted 1975). Without his determination to achieve enlightened country planning, the national parks including Eryri might not have flourished (insofar as they have). And the preservation movement owes a great deal to his abilities as an indefatigable author, often in collaboration with his writer-wife Amabel. Looking back, it is hard to see how he could have become a national architectural figure without his pulpit – symbolised in his dramatic structures – at Portmeirion.
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