So is the problem location? For all that it is within easy walking distance of the centre, it is remote from the heart of Birmingham as it has evolved over the past decade or more. That Birmingham is expanding steadily westwards past Symphony Hall, home of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra. Millennium Point has been placed out east, and is meant to be the start of a big regeneration of this former industrial area. But no, that can’t be it. Eden is in the back of beyond, and people flock there. So if it not the architecture or the location - and given that the content is no better or worse than many other such science centres around the country, and all Imax cinemas show the same few films - then it must be the message. It is not immediately apparent what Millennium Point is trying to be. The message is confused. People don’t go to places when they are not sure what they are going to find there. The name tells you nothing. Eden, in contrast, promises you everything.

Even though the new Selfridges is still a construction site, the battle of the Birmingham landmarks has already been won. Whether you regard the building as an exotic toadstool, a sequined boob tube, or an alien spacecraft is immaterial. This is already the new Birmingham. There is no building like it anywhere else in the world. It is clever in the way it exploits the need of a department store to be a windowless black box, ingenious in the way it turns the corner and commands its vistas. One hopes that the silver discs dotting its exterior are well fixed, and won’t start dropping off, that the underlying blue will not fade. When its interiors are complete, it promises to be in the radical tradition of the great Parisian department stores of the Belle Epoque. It marks, in that sense, the culmination or rebirth of a tradition. And of course it will sell stuff. It makes no pretence at any kind of social good beyond retail therapy. Is this culture? In the end, it is probably a lot closer to real urban culture than the earnest attempts of the Millennium Commission along the road.