Anthony Cox student drawings

This drawer at our RIBA Collections outstore contains a portfolio of Anthony Cox’s student work from his time at the Architectural Association (AA) where, a star pupil with a radical bent, he campaigned to transform the traditional tenets of the school's teaching.

Cox and his fellow activist students produced the "Yellow Book" in 1937, outlining their vision for a curriculum based on modernist principles, and prompting a period of fierce debate and tumultuous change at the school. The AA's structure gave students an unusual amount of sway over how the school was run, allowing them to vote at governing meetings. 

Among Cox's student drawings is a sketchbook showing his life drawing practice and studies for more finished drawings, where the distinctive wood grain patterns and human figures can be traced from the sketches.

Cox went on to co-found the Architects' Co-operative Partnership (ACP) with fellow AA graduates in 1939, the collaborative best known for the Brynmawr Rubber Company factory. He and his younger brother Oliver Cox also designed a number of pre-fabricated schools for Hertfordshire County Council, like the Carpenders Primary School that you can see in drawings in the Beyond Bauhaus exhibition.