This paper demonstrates how the built can bring together seemingly disparate debates in architectural and urban research by examining Shakespeare’s Globe. It suggests a reconceptualization of the Globe, a structure well studied in Shakespearean scholarship, as one of the first cultural institutions to be proposed on the Thames Bankside. The Globe’s prolonged planning and building delay, between 1970 and 1997, will be used to reflect on how changes in industries, planning mechanisms, and politics shaped architecture. As part of this effort, this research considers the Globe’s struggles with factors and processes that are fundamental to building: acquiring a site, planning permission, and workers.

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