“At the heart of our urban strategy lies the concept that cities are for the meeting of friends and strangers in civilised public spaces surrounded by beautiful buildings.” Lord Rogers, Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners


"It is sad to contrast the brutalism of the CB1 development with this lovely bit of Cambridge vernacular" Professor M. Beard, Cambridge University

"A lively and bustling atmosphere will be created by the office workers, residents and visitors to the city making use of the new amenities." from The Vision, The CB1 site

"Large open public spaces have been designed to be like a series of interconnected ‘rooms’." from The Vision, The CB1 site

"Living within CB1, residents will be in the new hub of one of the most exciting new City quarters in the UK." from The Residential Development, The CB1 site

"A cosmopolitan mix of high-quality shops, restaurants, pavement cafés and supermarkets will be located throughout the development, many located around Station Square." From The Vision, The CB1 site

"We expect big buildings, we expect big footprints, we expect developers who are forever pressing for more and more opportunities for development." Cllr John Hipkin

"We in this city are losing a fine Victorian building, and for what? This ghastly modern building, this huge development which is going to be out of scale for the people and out of scale with its environment" Frank Gawthrop, Friends of Wilton Terrace, Cambridge.

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"This isn't the Cambridge the local people in this city want. It's some sort of dystopian future we don't want – this is a sad day for Cambridge... Cambridge residents are tired of the loss of our heritage and damage to the city’s historic skyline."

"I believe the whole CB1 scheme is ghastly and dreadful. I wish it hadn't happened" Cllr John Hipkin, Cambridge

"I'm afraid that is the state of play and that is the future, I'm afraid, of our city." Cllr John Hipkin

About CB1:
CeeBee portrays the ‘shifting phase’ of CB1 Station Road development in Cambridge and questions what has been gained and lost.
There was "a high-profile and costly legal battle between developers Brookgate and the city council over the demolition of Wilton Terrace" (Cambridge News, 2015, July 27). Local residents put a lot of effort in to trying to save Wilton Terrace. More than 400 people wrote to the Inspector to ask for the developer's plans to be rejected. Despite these efforts, Victorian Wilton Terrace, thought to be the work of Cambridge designer Richard Reynolds Rowe, was demolished by the developers, to be replaced by a giant office block. The footprint of the buildings that the Inspector approved will be around 40% bigger than outlined in the original application and its skyline will be 8 metres higher than Kings College Chapel.
A place is a cultural construct, a reflection of who we are, of our cultural identity and experiences: we fill a space with symbolic and cultural references and it becomes a ‘place.’
“We feel such a profound and apparently disproportionate anguish when a loved landscape is altered…we lose not only a place, but ourselves, a continuity between the shifting phases of our life” (Drabble, 1979)
The CeeBee photo book can be viewed and ordered here: CeeBee