A Shift in Scale: Tony Fretton Moves from the Small to the Large Scale

A Shift in Scale Tony Fretton Moves from the Small to the Large Scale
It's a tricky step for any architect to move from the small to the large scale.

Tony Fretton is making the leap with three high-end residential schemes in Amsterdam. Ellis Woodman discovers whether he has managed the transition.

The moment in an architect's career when their work makes a jump in scale is always a heady one.

Positions that bewitched when tested at the scale of a house can suddenly shed their charm when required to support a project of 10 times the size.

Conversely, the authors of work that struggled for impact at a small scale can be revealed as adroit manipulators of urban form when they eventually find the opportunity to take on bigger commissions.

One architect currently navigating this difficult transition is Tony Fretton.

Fretton is one of the handful of British architects whose work enjoys a widespread international following, but his stature has long been belied by the scale of the projects that he has managed to realise.

That is changing, but in the shabby tradition of British talent having to board a plane to get anything built, it is mainland Europe that is now providing the opportunities that he has struggled to find in the UK.

The Netherlands, where Fretton's practice has three major housing schemes under way, has proved a particularly receptive climate.