All around the world there are hundreds of architects who have acquired a local or even national notoreity yet lie somewhat hidden from full global recognition because architectural publications have glossed over them and so we don’t recall them from Architecture 101. As Hans Ibelings has recently written: “Most architecture magazines justify their existence by showing the architectural hits of the day. And if the projects they publish are not already hits, they become so simply by virtue of being featured in all the relevant media.” Yet not all hits are great and similarly not all that is great was a hit if it lacked the marketing budget. Furthermore sometimes we like our music to be personal and not part of a global machination. Ditto our architecture, so let’s consider the ‘architectural miss’ and excavate beneath the printed surface of architecture for some gems. Luc Deleu in Belgium, Clorindo Testa in Argentina, Rewi Thompson in New Zealand, [INSERT NAMES / LOCATIONS] would today make a compilation album of architectural B-sides that, in the hands of a decent publisher-distributor, would be a smash hit. Add to this role call, Australia’s Ivan Ivanov. Whilst in Perth participating in the 2011 Affirmative Architecture symposium, WHAT_architecture visited a wonderously quirky domestic project by ‘I-I’. This 1970s house was materialised as some kind of concrete coconut (concrete block exterior, shag pile interior) and now, sensitively restored by its new owners, is ripe for protection / listing. Featuring a dance floor, architectural conservation would then have its first ‘heritage disco’. Never before has an architecture segued so seamlessly into it’s soundscape. Mr Ivanov, a monograph awaits you! (Try Duncan at BDP).

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