Controversy
Murphy has sometimes attracted controversy. The conversion of John Muir's birthplace in Dunbar attracted angry letters from around the world, in the belief that he was destroying the house as it was when Muir was born. It was in fact simply replacing a new interior representing how the house 'may have been' at the time.
His Mews House on Circus Lane in the New Town of Edinburgh was dubbed the 'Japanese House' by the local press, and felt an inappropriate design for a World Heritage Site, though it subsequently won planning permission.
The proposed Sean Connery Filmhouse would be built over Festival Square in Edinburgh. The square, part of The Exchange Business district designed by Terry Farrell, is felt by many to be a failure. The square is often empty, and as Murphy pointed out, is, despite its name, one of the few places in the city without any presence of the Edinburgh festival in the summer. The MSP Brian Monteith even dubbed the square Ceauşescu piazza. Despite this, the Sheraton Hotels is deeply against the proposals, as the building would be right in front of the hotel, and block residents' views of Edinburgh Castle.
Read more about this topic: Richard Murphy (architect)
Famous quotes containing the word controversy:
“Ours was a highly activist administration, with a lot of controversy involved ... but I’m not sure that it would be inconsistent with my own political nature to do it differently if I had it to do all over again.”
—Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.)
“And therefore, as when there is a controversy in an account, the parties must by their own accord, set up for right Reason, the Reason of some Arbitrator, or Judge, to whose sentence, they will both stand, or their controversy must either come to blows, or be undecided, for want of a right Reason constituted by Nature; so is it also in all debates of what kind soever.”
—Thomas Hobbes (1579–1688)