The fact that Norman Foster wants to start building social housing again after 40 years is a sign that a lot of it may be about to be built, says Owen Hatherley.

In the 1970s Foster designed a council estate for the first and last time. Bean Hill, in Milton Keynes, was devised in the early 1970s by the young firm during the last period that the amount of council housing builds rivalled those of the private market.
It was planned as an experimental, Archigram-type scheme of clip-together small houses, in an informal, suburban layout. Shortages of materials and problems on site led to what you'll find there now ? scattered tin houses with great big mock Tudor pitched roofs attached in the 1990s to stop the incessant leaks.
Unlike other Foster projects in non-metropolitan England in the 1970s ? say, the Sainsbury Centre in Norwich, IBM in Portsmouth, or Willis Faber in Ipswich ? it's unlisted and unlistable. After this showing, it's doubtful they'd have been asked to design housing again ? until now, that is. Alongside recent reports that show a sharp rise in council housing completions in Britain comes the news that Foster + Parners, by now a globe-bestriding architectural megacorp, is planning to get into the non-market housing market. This isn't a sign of social commitment ?  something that has never been much of a factor for Foster ? but due to the fact that a lot of it might be built soon. So what could Foster bring to social housing today"
After its last showing...