MODERN LOVE
Eddy Rhead finds beauty and purity in unlikely places, usually while riding his bike. Where others see just concrete pillars holding up a motorway flyover, Eddy sees an “epic piece of architecture designed to improve people’s lives”.
As the editor of The Modernist magazine, he has been extolling the merits of post-war buildings and infrastructure – ranging from power stations and office blocks to bridges and churches – that most of us, at best, take for granted or, at worst, find ugly and intrusive.
Today’s ride starts ominously in an industrial estate on the edge of Manchester but will, Eddy assures me, take us past some stunning examples of Modernism, as well as through some beautiful countryside.
“This would be considered a decent route from a purely cycling point of view, never mind the architecture along the way,” he explains.
Our first stop on this wet October morning is a concrete hangar behind railings and razor wire. “This is Wythenshawe bus garage,” announces Eddy with a sparkle in his eye as if he’s introducing me to Scarlett Johansson on a blind date. “It has technological merits, not just artistic. Its single-span concrete arch earned it Grade II listing – that’s the
