This essay reconnects Hamilton's work and interest of the early 1950s with urgent contemporary debates about the role of architecture and urbanism in rebuilding post-war European cities. Through new research findings made by the author during the reconstruction of Hamilton's seminal 1951 exhibition 'Growth and Form' (ICA) it discusses key questions Hamilton was raising about the arguments for cluster, emergent urban design versus Le Corbusier's proposition of zoned, gridded urban development and housing based on his 'modular man' model. It places Hamilton's interest in urban design with contemporary theoretical thinking about regeneration posited by Sigfried Giedion.