So Scruton’s out and Boys Smith is in – but will it really make a difference?

By Mark Leeson 2019-05-16T12:07:00

Beauty should be something that is defined locally, not the subject of a grand commission in London, says Mark Leeson

Last month’s sacking of Sir Roger Scruton, chair of the government’s Building Better, Building Beautiful commission, for allegedly making “unacceptable comments” in an interview with the New Statesman was greeted with predictably joyous cries from across the construction professions.

Since then, there’s been an ongoing “did he, didn’t he” spat over whether or not Scruton made the remarks attributed to him. But the divisive Scruton was, of course, already a controversial choice for the role of chair.

A critic of modernist design, Scruton was never going to embrace innovation in contemporary archite

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