Records of the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment: Design and...

CABE 7

1999-2011

This series contains records relating to the history of Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE)'s design advice and support activities in both the public sector (Enabling Programme) and across the regions of England.

CABE's Enabling Programme. This public sector client support programme operated through a number of specialist Enablers, working as consultants to CABE, providing technical advice direct to client organisations in the early stages of a project. Enablers included academics, architects, urban designers, landscape architects, planners, planning lawyers, development managers, project managers, builders and masterplanners; as well as specialists in housing, heritage, health, education, regeneration, and sustainability.

Alongside this programme of advice and support for public sector clients, CABE also supported established external regional partner organisations, and helped to fund a network of independent Architecture and Built Environment Centres (ABECs) in regions throughout England; also collaborating with and funding the Architecture Centre Network (the national development and advocacy organisation for ABECs across the United Kingdom). CABE also supported and funded a series of initiatives piloting different approaches to working at regional and sub-regional level, known as the 'regional pilot programmes'.

The series includes:

• information on ABECs, and funding grants relating to local programmes and regional intervention.
• files covering early policy development relating to managing Enablers; conflicts of interest; payments and strategy.
• bi-monthly reports and final programme reports prepared by the Design and Planning Advice directorate.
• surveys and analysis relating to a number of evaluations of the impacts of enabling carried out between 2000 and 2011.
• files relating to the development of methods and strategies for enabling.
• unpublished documents and presentations.
• correspondence with the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG), English Partnerships (EP), and partner organisations.

Public Record(s)

English

110 file(s)

Open unless otherwise stated

In 2018 Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment

No further accruals are expected

Acquisition Policy Criteria 3.1 To record the principal policies and actions of UK central government and to document the state's interactions with its citizens and with the physical environment

The Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE), was established in September 1999, as a non-departmental public body sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS). CABE succeeded the former Royal Fine Art Commission (RFAC) which had been established by royal warrant in 1924 to advise on individual projects specifically referred to it by government departments and other public bodies. RFAC was eventually sponsored by the Department of the Environment and the Department fof National Heritage, but had no statutory powers and was abolished in April 1999.

CABE was funded by both DCMS and the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG).

CABE was made a statutory body by the Clean Neighbourhood and Envirnonment Act, 2005. CABE served as the government's statutory adviser on architecture, urban design and public space in England. Its remit was to influence and inspire the people making decisions about the built environment; working directly with architects, planners, designers and clients.

CABE's remit did not cover Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland. The equivalent body in Scotland is Architecture and Design Scotland.