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About Me

I am currently a Lecturer in Architectural Studies at the University of Manchester, an Associate Lecturer at Chelsea College of Arts and also guest lecture in Museum Studies. Before entering academia, I worked in the museum sector for 15 years, holding curatorial positions at London Transport Museum, Kingston Museum and as Paul Mellon Research Curator at the Royal Society of Sculptors. Combining my museum and academic experience, I have taught and published on the subject of contemporary collecting and ethics. Through my academic work, I continue to collaborate with museums, most recently with the People’s Museum, Somers Town and the Imperial War Museum.

My PhD, ”Concrete citizens’: the Lodnon County Council’s sculpture and housing schemes, 1949-1965′ looks at the London County Council’s post-war housing schemes containing  sculpture depicting the human figure. My research positions these artworks in the context of wartime and post-war planning for London, concentrating on the London County Council’s housing of communities, and how these communities reacted to their new environments. I am looking at the artworks in their physical and intellectual context, to reveal the LCC’s wider intent for the post-war housing of Londoners.

Both through my research and professional work, I continue to engage with community heritage and public history. I am interested in public and community engagement with heritage and the built environment and have researched, written and led architectural tours for Open City, the V&A, London Festival of Architecture and the Architecture Foundation. I have recently completed my PhD and am a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.

Recent Publications

Cordner, S., Kavanagh, J., Miles, E. & West, R. L. (eds) Ethics and Contemporary Collecting, (London: Routledge, forthcoming publication date May 2024)

Miles, E & West, R. L. ‘Documenting COVID-19: Sensitivity, Care, Collaboration’ in Collections Management as Critical Practice, (London: UCL Press, forthcoming publication date Summer 2024)

West, R. L. ‘Elisabeth Frink’s ‘Blind Beggar and his Dog’ on the Cranbook estate’, Architecture and Culture, (forthcoming 2024)

West, R. L. ‘Dockers in Poplar: The Legacy of the London County Council’s Replanning of Poplar, East London’, Urban Planning, vol. 8 no.1 (2023)

Rudd, N., Veasey, M. & West, R. L. ‘Introduction’ in Rudd, N., Veasey, M. & West, R. L. (eds) ‘Pioneering Women sculptors’ special issue, The Sculpture Journal, vol. 32, issue 1 (March 2022)

‘Each For All And All For Each – the buildings of the Royal Arsenal Co-Operative Society’, in Hatherley, O (ed). The Alternative Guide to the London Boroughs, (London: Open House Publishing) 2020

‘I Am Convinced I Shall Achieve Something Valuable If I Can Brighten the Lives of the People Here’: Bombsites, Housing and Art in Lambeth’. The London Journal, DOI: 10.1080/03058034.2019.1706952,

‘The ‘Pioneering Women’ in the archive of the Royal Society of Sculptors’, ALISS quarterly, vol. 15, no.1, October 2019, p.18-20

‘Pioneering Women’, PMC notes, no. 13, October 2019, p.11-13

‘Have you met the Neighbours’. Modernist magazine, Inventory, issue 29, Winter 2018. December 2018

Media Coverage

• I have created podcasts for Placecloud on LCC sculptures (2021), been a guest on Open City’s ‘Londown’ podcast (https://open-city.org.uk/podcast January 2022) and been featured on Cogitatio Press’s ‘Let’s Talk About Urban Planning’ podca

Social Media

@Rosamund_Lil

Country Focus

England

Expertise by Geography

England, United Kingdom

Expertise by Chronology

20th century

Expertise by Topic

Art & Architectural History, Museums, Public History, Urban History, Women