Aimée L Felton 2012

21 The system of listing and acknowledging historical, heritage, social and cultural importance of buildings within the UK (primarily England) is commonly misconstrued as a founding leader, however, the conception of the selection process was relatively late in comparison to other European nations, especially France (Pendlebury, J. 2001, as cited in Pickard, R. 2001:p289). However, in defence of the many conservationist practitioners and extensive conservation work accomplished within the UK, it is to be noted that many British professionals provide an active contribution to the development of the various ICOMOS charters (ibid. 2001:p302). As previously mentioned the British system embraces a wide variety of buildings, structures and ensures protection over the buildings by enforcing application before consent is granted to any alterations to existing fabric. However the legislation in all its forms fails to obligate the owners to keep the fabric in good repair, even though the importance of maintenance management was realised 150 years ago (Allan, G. 1999: p26) at the first recital. It is not ideally designed for new conservation initiatives, or to provide financial assistance, due to the premise that many of the buildings on the ‘ Statutory List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest ’ are not of any particular antiquity (with only 4% categorised as Grade I) therefore are capable of earning their upkeep and therefore almost all of the responsibility lying with the owner (Earl, J. 2003:p47). Hermann Muthesius in 1902 stated ‘maintenance instead of reconstruction; that is the general aim of conservation’ (Earl, J. 2003:p9), however, this notion of absolute protection and minimum intervention has remained the standard legislative philosophy, with no governmental attempt to redraft the documents to allow for the dramatic social, political and cultural changes that have occurred since the early 20th century. However, subsequent drafts and alterations to the legislation have developed enormously to include restrictions TWO Chapter Two - Context Aimee Felto