Leader Developers may be panicking, but there is no need for architects to emulate them

摘要

Our correspondent returned from the British Council for Offices conference in Brussels last week with a sinking feeling (see pages 12-13).The commercial sector is beginning to catch the cold that has been afflicting the residential sector with such a vengeance in the last three months. And if their loss of confidence sets in, we could be in for a rocky time. We've asked, and you guys seem to be quite confident at the moment. 'We've stopped recruiting', is as far as some of you will go to suggest that things are slowing. Others spin it in a more positive light: 'It's a lot easier to recruit than 12 months ago', you say, in a glass-half-full way. However, the clouds are gathering. I heard this week that a major estate agent in Birmingham has laid off an astonishing 95 per cent of its work force - it simply can't sell anything in the commercial or residential sector. Taylor Wimpey, Crest Nicholson, Bellway and Persimmon are making redundancies in the hundreds and most have cut profitability predictions. Residential starts have fallen in an unprecedented way. Now the commercial office sector is beginning to get worried. Rents are anticipated to fall in the next quarter according the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, and some large developers' profits, and share prices, have already been hit.