New Labour came to power in 1997 amid much talk of regenerating theinner cities left to rot under successive Conservative governments. Overthe next decade, urban environments became the
laboratories of the newenterprise economy: of finance, property speculation, and the serviceindustry. Now, with New Labour capsized, Owen Hatherley sets out toexplore the wreckage––the
architecture that epitomized an age of greed andselfish aspiration. From riverside apartment complexes, art galleries andamorphous interactive “centers” to shopping malls, call centers and
factoriesturned into expensive lofts, Hatherley maps the derelict Britain of the 2010s,an emphatic expression of a failed politics.
