Brighton is so much more attractive than its main resort rivals because of its many magnificent buildings.

No other seaside town can boast anything like the exotic, extraordinary Royal Pavilion with its domes and minarets.

They cannot come near to matching the grandeur of the great squares and terraces of Kemp Town and Hove.

Leading architects of the day built their best work in Brighton with John Nash’s Pavilion the prime example.

Marine engineer Eugenius Birch saved his masterpiece, the West Pier, for the resort and no other pier has beaten it for beauty.

Charles Barry left his mark on Brighton with St Peter’s Church, the Royal Sussex County Hospital, and St Andrew’s in Waterloo Street, Hove.

Lesser known architects such as the locally-based Amon Wilds and Charles Busby were inspired to rival their famous contemporaries in designing fine buildings.

There was no lessening of standards during the Victorian age. Handsome buildings were erected, particularly along the seafront where they were admired by many visitors.

Brighton was also graced by a set of churches which cannot be matched in any other provincial city including the austere St Bartholomew’s and the ambitious St Paul’s.

During the 1920s and 1930s, some of the best modernist and Art Deco buildings like Embassy Court and St Wilfrid’s Church continued the high standards of architecture.

But the long line of landmark buildings came to an abrupt end with the Second World War and has not been revived since then.

It is hard to think of many if any buildings in the last 80 years that could really be considered great.

Sussex Heights, the tallest block of flats in the county, has some merits but is the wrong building in the wrong place.

Hove Town Hall is a fine example of early 1970s buildings like the National Theatre in London that were uncompromising and almost brutal in their approach and I still feel it should be listed.

Great opportunities were missed to take advantage of Brighton’s steep contours in designing replacements in the 1960s for slums.

Ghastly slabs of flats were built on many of the main avenues in Hove with the worst excesses in New Church Road and Kingsway.

Meanwhile, many notable buildings were lost to unwarranted demolition such as the Attree Villa, the Lourdes Convent and the Central School in Church Street.

Brighton Marina, which should have provided an unequalled opportunity for innovative design, instead emerged as a sad sprawl of undistinguished buildings bearing little relation to each other or the nearby sea.

Attempts have been made to bring leading architects back to Brighton. Frank Gehry had interesting ideas for housing on the King Alfred site in Hove.

Jim Eyre produced pleasing designs for part of the Marina site while Piers Gough, born on the Brunswick estate in Hove, tried his hardest to improve standards in his home city.

Some may cite Sussex University as good architecture but I find Sir Basil Spence’s red bricked and concrete buildings drab and disappointing.

I cannot get all that excited about the Jubilee Library in Brighton which seems to be just another glass-fronted box.

There are still opportunities for new buildings to rival or even exceed the high standards of past eras. One of them is the Brighton i360, a slim and soaring tower which I trust will be built soon.

This could in turn encourage the design of a truly 21st century pier on the site of Birch’s glorious creation.

Toad’s Hole Valley in Hove could be the site of attractive buildings making full use of the bowl-like site while there is plenty of potential for dazzling seaside architecture at Black Rock.

Few modern buildings in Brighton are as crass as those in the 1960s, such as the Bedford Hotel on the seafront or Theobald House by the station.

But most are rather ordinary and unimaginative like the new flats being built in Old Shoreham Road near Hove Park. They have urbanised a green corner of Hove without offering any compensating merit in their design.

Brighton rivals Bath and Cheltenham in its Regency architecture. Its last Victorian churches are unsurpassed and its Art Deco buildings are inspiring.

But it badly needs bold new buildings to impress both visitors and residents. Otherwise it is in danger of losing its reputation for amazing architecture..