London from Punk to Blair was the first historical and theoretical enquiry into the history of London from 1977 to 2002. I investigated the premise that, during this period, the process of fragmentation and diversification that epitomises contemporary London accelerated and complexified to the point at which any notion of a comprehensive understanding of the city has become unfeasible.

In the introduction I proposed a specific reading of London during this era, mapped onto a personal autobiography of my own identical period of residence in London. I evoked a visual, spatial and experiential depiction of the city, drawing on specific historical accounts (Summerson, Wright, Porter) while proposing a new reading of London to decipher its character in the early 21st century. There is no other comparable collection of essays covering such a discrete and recent era of London history.

My essay 'Blowdown: The Rise and Fall of London's Tower Blocks' is the first historical/political account of the brief but significant period of high-rise housing construction in London and its troubled aftermath. Through archival research and interviews with architects, politicians, residents and activists, I demonstrated that neither the uncritical adulation that greeted the first generation of tower blocks nor the condemnation of contemporary commentators is a useful or valid stance in considering such a significant component of London's modern built environment. Instead, my essay proposes a critical rethink of attitudes towards tower blocks, analysing the economics of the wholesale demolition of these blocks. I presented conference and symposium papers at Tate Britain, the Museum of London, the London School of Economics, the Art Historians' Annual Conference, Architecture Foundation and the Pratt Institute New York). I also made documentary programmes for BBC Radio 4. The book was reviewed in the Art Papers, the London Evening Standard and Building Design.