Janet Abrams reflects on the Arab Institute on Paris's Left Bank (architect Jean Nouvel, 1988), one of President Mitterand's portfolio of buildings designed to change the profile of Paris.

Architect Nigel Coates delights in Chelsea Football Stadium's East Stand (Darbourne and Darke, 1972).

Television executive and ex-architecture student Janet Street-Porter asked Piers Gough to design a house for her in London's Smithfield. For the first time on television, she shows the result.

Peter Palumbo, chairman of the Arts Council, praises Holland House, an office block built in the City of London by the Dutch architect Berlage.

Writer Gillian Darley examines the new award-winning David Mellor Cutlery Factory in the Peak District of Derbyshire. Designed by architect Michael Hopkins and opened this year, it is extraordinary because it is round.

Artist and photographer Jenny Okun visits the Blackburn House in London's Hampstead, by architects Peter Wilson and Chassay Wright (1989). She argues that the Blackburn House - part office, part gallery, part flat - is important because really adventurous domestic architecture is such a rarity.

The Boots factory is a vast glass palace built by Owen Williams in 1932. Iwona Blazwick from London's ICA tours the factory which is acknowledged as a masterpiece of early British modernism.

Architect Edward Cullinan thinks the best post-war building in London is the Royal College of Physicians in Regent's Park, designed by Sir Denys Lasdun in 1960.

Internationally renowned architect James Stirling examines the Katharine Stephen Room - rare books library of Newnham College, Cambridge (1988 Birkin Haward/Joanna Van Heyningen).

Architect, Sir Norman Foster, looks at the jumbo jet.

Writer Marina Warner is inspired by Didcot Power Station in Oxfordshire.

Artist Michael Craig-Martin marvels at Lloyds of London.

Architect Sand Helsel applauds Trellick Tower, a 1967 tower block in north London by Erno Goldfinger.

Sandy Naime, director of visual arts at the Arts Council, looks at St Mary's, a new NHS hospital on the Isle of Wight by Ahrends, Burton and Koralek.

Tessa Blackstone, Master of Birkbeck College, University of London, praises the Michelin building in London.

Court House in Truro, Cornwall is admired by the artist Deanna Petherbridge.

Leicester University Engineering Building is one of only a few buildings that have had a powerful effect on structural engineer Tim MacFarlane: 'For me, this building is a work of art.'

To Alice Rawsthorn, design correspondent of The Financial Times, St Olaf House (1931) is 'a little island of art deco splendour tucked away between the south bank of the River Thames and the railway arches of London Bridge. It's one of those quirky places, where everything down to the tiniest detail was designed in a very particular way.'

Film director and artist Derek Jarman visits Garden House in Wimborne, Dorset, built by his art master Robin Noscoe.

Alan Bennett wanders through the County Arcade, Leeds (Frank Matcham 1900).

Architect Richard MacCormac marvels at the Boarbank Hall Oratory near Grange over Sands, Cumbria.

Jools Holland's love of panoramic views takes him to Britain's tallest tower, Canary Wharf in London. From a vantage point atop the 50-floor structure the musician and presenter looks out over the capital city.

Damien Hirst, controversial winner of last year's Turner Prize, enjoys the juxtaposition of life and death at the Worsley Medical Building in Leeds where, as a student, he used to do anatomical drawings.

Architect Will Alsop visits an unconventional private house built with glass walls.

Poet Simon Armitage finds inspiration in the longest suspension bridge in the world. Opened in 1981, the Humber Bridge is 1.3 miles long and, he feels, is "one of the modern wonders of the world".

Cartoonist Posy Simmonds discovers a remarkable police station in Wood Street in the City of London.

Architect Sir Richard Rogers praises Alton housing estate in Roehampton. Built in the 1950s by the London County Council, Alton was planned to be a modern Utopia.

Architect Zaha Hadid chooses the Willis Corroon building in the centre of Ipswich, Suffolk, a high-tech seventies work by Sir Norman Foster.

Writer Germaine Greer chooses the Glyndebourne Opera House on the Sussex Downs. The building, which opened in 1994, was constructed in just 18 months and was designed by Michael Hopkins and Patty Hopkins.