Cash hope for zoo buildings; HERITAGE: Iconic structures put on monuments at risk list.Byline: Steve Bradley Steve Bradley is an American professional wrestler who has competed on North American independent promotions throughout the 1990s including East Coast Wrestling Association, IWA Puerto Rico and the National Wrestling Alliance as well as spending over three years World Wrestling DUDLEY Zoo Dudley Zoological Gardens is a zoo located within the grounds of Dudley Castle in the town of Dudley which is part of the Black Country in the West Midlands, hopes to secure restoration funding for its 12 iconic Tecton buildings following the World Monuments Fund's recognition of their need for protection. The Grade Two-listed buildings, constructed by renowned Russian architect Berthold Lubetkin Berthold Romanovich Lubetkin (December 14 1901 — October 23 1990) was a Russian emigré architect who pioneered modernist design in Britain in the 1930s. Early Years , have been put on the organisation's international watch list of threatened heritage, alongside the legendary Machu Picchu site in Peru. And now staff hope to use this world recognition to secure funding from English Heritage to restore and conserve the striking organic concrete structures built as enclosures for some of the world's rarest animals. Lubetkin and the group of architects who designed the zoo, which opened in 1937, called themselves the Tecton Group and the style of building was named after them. Dudley Zoo has the world's largest collection of Tectons, attracting visits from architects and heritage groups from all over Europe and further afield. Zoo chief executive Peter Suddock, pictured below, said: "We have been working closely with the 20th Century Society and English Heritage for almost two years and this is the culmination of those efforts - to ensure a global focus on the w o r l d 's largest collection of Te c t o n build-ings. "The announcement puts us on the world map and will help us get funds for the restoration of these important buildings. "They have long been recognised as architecturallyimportant structures." Lion Ridge, a pounds 500,000 wraparound Wraparound A financing device that permits an existing loan to be refinanced and new money to be advanced at an interest rate between the rate charged on the old loan and the current market interest rate. enclosure and paddocks for highly endangered Asian lions, incorporates the site's iconic Tecton Birdhouse in its innovative design and opened to the public at Easter. Mr Suddock added: "Our aim now is for the Tectons to become internationally recognised which will help us to secure funding." Dr Jonathan Foyle, chief executive of World Monuments Fund The World Monuments Fund (WMF) is a New York-based private, non-profit organization dedicated to the preservation of historic architecture and cultural heritage sites worldwide through fieldwork, advocacy, grantmaking, education, and training. Britain, said at the launch of the list: "We've become a world of city slickers, with urbanites now outnumbering their rural cousins. "Towns and cities are under greater pressure to make way for their new inhabitants, resulting in sites of historic significance being torn down in the name of progress, while land and traditional historic buildings in the countryside are left untended and abandoned." CAPTION(S): Under threat: some of the iconic Tecton Buildings at Dudley Zoo. |
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