Over the past few weeks I’ve been thinking about buildings, thanks to a programme I heard discussing the idea that architecture has lost its soul.

The issue made me take a closer look at this sculpture near St Mary’s Axe in the City in London. From a distance it looks like a cartoon reproduction of an old building, planted deliberately amongst the new skyscrapers in the area.

The sight of this coloured version, so different yet so familiar, balancing awkwardly on its pedestals, has cheered me up whenever I’ve seen it. I suppose I might be responding to its soul, and that, according to the plaque beside it, is what the artist wants us to do. The title of the piece is The Granary and its creator, Jesse Pollock, is from Kent, where old granary stores can still be found. With this version Pollock is asking us to recognise that although it looks rosy, its battered profile is to give an idea of how tough its life is, facing one crisis after the next.

“… The Granary speaks as much to a need to overcome these crises as it does to the vexed rhetoric that underpins established visions of the nation, its heritage and our place within it.”

Reading these words has added another layer to my looking. From now on I shall think of it as the battered red heart powering the steely-faced, glassy-eyed buildings that surround it, yet do not notice it.

Copyright Georgie Knaggs & The Phraser 2023