Maxwell Hutchinson (b1948)

CONTROVERSIAL architect Maxwell Hutchinson came to the public’s attention in 1984 with his vigourous rebuttal of the Prince of Wales’s criticism of contemporary architecture.

His analytical book Prince of Wales: Right or Wrong was a best seller.

Ironically, in 1987 the Prince opened the King’s School Centre for Industrial Studies in Maxwell’s birthplace – No1 Church Street.

He was elected the youngest ever president of the Royal Institute of British Architects and served from 1989-1991.

He has been a practising architect in Central London for 30 years – his best known projects being Skylines on the Isle of Dogs, J S Pathology at Camden Lock and Aztec Row in Islington.

The son of former Grantham architect Frank Hutchinson, the family later moved to Casthorpe Road, Barrowby. He was educated at a private school in Barrowby, then to Wellington School, near Oundle.

He spent some time in the family business, in Finkin Street and St Catherine’s Road, before setting off for the bright lights of London.

Maxwell is also a broadcaster and writer having completed three 15-part series for Discovery Television covering such topics as living in a garden shed with only junk.

He has also presented the recent Channel4 series Demolition Detectives and more recently Number 57, also for Channel 4 on the 200-year history of a house in Bristol.

Yet he nearly made his career in music instead.

He plays a range of instruments including the guitar, piano, saxophone and double bass and formed a band in Aberdeen to pay his way through university and later a show band with go-go girls.

He said: “I saw myself as a Jimmi Hendrix figure, after all we both had curly hair.”

He has written three musicals for the theatre, including one staged at the Lyric Theatre in Hammersmith, London.

He said: “I really enjoyed it, but one night, returning from the Lyric Theatre and facing a £37 taxi bill, I thought nobody will make money from this, so I turned back to architecture.

“I also enjoy the TV and radio work. It brings out the exhibitionist in me.”

But Maxwell didn’t completely turn his back on music. He wrote a requiem mass while living in Empringham, which was performed for the 600th anniversary of Peterborough Cathedral and more recently a Christmas carol for the Church of St Mary-le-Bow in Cheapside, London.

He still enjoys the architecture of his birthplace although there is one he really dislikes.

“The Guildhall is a municipal joke,” he said.