BBC Radio 4

BBC Radio 4 is a radio channel that started transmitting on the 30th September 1967. It replaced BBC Home Service.

Radio 4

Intelligent speech, the most insightful journalism, the wittiest comedy, the most fascinating features and the most compelling drama and readings anywhere in UK radio.

BBC Radio 4 LW

The Concrete and the Divine 

Documentaries

Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

BBC Radio 4 Extra - The Concrete and the Divine

Jonathan Glancey finds out about the architects who revolutionised church design.

4 Extra Debut. Jonathan Glancey explores the revolutionary modern British church architecture of Andrew MacMillan and Isi Metzstein. From 2013.

Under the umbrella of Glasgow architects Gillespie Kidd & Coia, Isi Metzstein and Andrew MacMillan seized on the momentary experimentalism of the Catholic Church after World War II to revolutionise church design.

This was a brave new world and the Catholic Church wanted their places of worship to meet the needs of a new era. 

In a culture never quite comfortable with the high modern influences of Europe and America, Metzstein and MacMillan drew on the ideas of Le Corbusier and Frank Lloyd Wright with unparalleled freedom.

Their masterpiece was St Peter's Seminary at Cardross, which stood out like a spaceship in the modest construction yards of British architecture. It's a ghost space now, abandoned in 1980 just 14 years after completion.

While most of their churches are still in use, their Modernist design and location means they stand like monuments to a very different time; a time when Catholicism in Scotland was expected to spread its wings. 

Jonathan Glancey explores Scotland's physical and spiritual landscape to discover more about the extraordinary lives of two of Britain's most talented architects.

Producer: Caitlin Smith

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in April 2013.

BBC Radio 4 Extra

Your digital radio entertainment station showcasing the best in comedy and drama

Your digital radio entertainment station showcasing the best in comedy and drama. With recent favourites from BBC Radio 4.

Accessibility links

Programme Index

The Concrete and the Divine

Genres

Formats

BBC Radio 4 LW

About BBC Radio 4