David Watkin

‘See one, do one, teach one’ was the basis of David Watkin’s training as a surgeon in the 1960s. By the time he became a consultant, he had ample experience but had received little supervision. He was determined to improve the experience for his juniors. Later, this led to chairmanship of the national committee responsible for training in general surgery. Not from a medical family and with no experience of serious illness or hospital, David had only decided to study medicine when in the sixth form. After training in Bristol, Leicester, Derby and Sheffield he was appointed a consultant in Leicester. He was then invited to be inaugural clinical sub-dean, in charge of setting up clinical teaching in the new Medical School. Comprising ‘guts, glands and arteries’, David relished the broad scope of general surgery, including emergencies. But surgery and the NHS were changing, with technological advances and surgical innovations. When general surgery evolved into specialties, he became a coloproctologist by day, though still a generalist at night. A member of the council of the Association of Surgeons, he was closely involved in these changes. Finally, he was elected president of the Association for 2000-1.

Far and away the best narrative of western architecture in existence...it stands out as an intellectual triumph. - Sir John SummersonIn this highly acclaimed, classic reference work David Watkin traces the history of western architecture from the earliest times in Mesopotamia and Egypt to the late twentieth century. For this seventh edition, revising author Owen Hopkins provides a new introduction contextualizing Watkin's approach. The final chapter on the twenty-first century has been completely rewritten by Hopkins, who brings the story right up to date with the inclusion of such topics as re-use, digital cities and virtual architecture.

John Simpson is one of the world s leading practitioners of new classicism, a contemporary architecture movement that continues the practice of classical and traditional architecture and embraces the virtues of durability, functionality, and beauty. Simpson s design ethos revolves around the notion that architecture is a public art where each facade forms the character and shape of the public realm the streets, the squares, and the major civic spaces that we use and as such must use a language of building that is recognisable and draws on our collective cultural experience. His architecture is thus understandable in a moment and is functional; it is built to last, to be beautiful, and to ensure the comfort and ease of those who experience it, be it the Queen s Gallery at Buckingham Palace in London or an apartment in a historic building in New York. The work shown covers a wide range, from small-scale residential and apartment design to the country house and the town house to large-scale institutional designs. Featured projects include a new academic quadrangle at Eton College; the new school of architecture at the University of Notre Dame; rooms at Kensington Palace; the Stanhope Hotel renovation in New York; town houses in Belgravia and Chelsea, London; and much more.

One of the most visited sites in Italy, the Roman Forum is also one of the best-known wonders of the Roman world. Though a highpoint on the tourist route around Rome, for many visitors the site can be a baffling disappointment. Several of the monuments turn out to be nineteenth- or twentieth-century reconstructions, while the rubble and the holes made by archaeologists have an unclear relationship to the standing remains, and, to all but the most skilled Romanists, the Forum is an unfortunate mess. David Watkin sheds completely new light on the Forum, examining the roles of the ancient remains while revealing what exactly the standing structures embody--including the rarely studied medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque churches, as well as the nearby monuments that have important histories of their own. Watkin asks the reader to look through the veneer of archaeology to rediscover the site as it was famous for centuries. This involves offering a remarkable and engaging new vision of a well-visited, if often misunderstood, wonder. It will be enjoyed by readers at home and serve as a guide in the Forum.

One of history's most published architectural treatises, this Renaissance volume solidified the architectural canon of the past five centuries. The distinguished architect known as Vignola identified the five orders — Tuscan, Doric, Ionic, Corinthian, and Composite — and illustrated them in full-page elevational detail. Accessible even to lay readers.

There are few more historic and evocative places in the world. Caesar was cremated there. Charles V and Mussolini rode by it in triumph. There Napoleon celebrated his festival of liberty. In this radical reappraisal David Watkin teaches us to see the Forum with new eyes and helps us to rediscover its rich history. This is as stimulating to the armchair traveller as it is useful as a guide to the Forum itself. 'With verve, authority and no little humour, Watkin tells the detailed and complex story of this great but mutilated landmark ... it is an almost impossible task, superbly done' Peter Jones, BBC History Magazine 'In this sprightly volume ... the distinguished architectural historian David Watkin charts the shifting fortunes of the site ... he has an engagingly romantic feeling for the place... deploying a good deal of sharp wit, he reveals how the relatively recent obsession with recovering the Forum's classical past has led to much unhappy destruction and much less scarcely happy invention' Matthew Sturgis, Country Life