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One Fen Court | City of London | 69m | 14 fl

194K views 482 replies 138 participants last post by  wjfox 
#1 · (Edited)
A large scheme has been submitted for an island site along Fenchurch St.
Architects - Eric Parry

Bit depressing really especially if you read the design & Access statements showing the evolution of the building with the worst option- A huge Plantation place MKII submitted. They did propose some interesting towers that would have been around the Willis height & would have partly filled the gap between 20FC & 51 Lime St when viewed from Waterloo.

These options were turned down because the CoL planners deemed that although it would contribute to the city cluster it would be right on the edge of this cluster & also "a modernist definition of space & buildings was not appropriate to this part of Fenchurch St."

Yet they have encouraged a huge block that takes up all the site & can only be considered a huge lump of a building.

http://www.planning.cityoflondon.go...=livevolume1&contentType=&wmName=&pageCount=1

http://www.planning.cityoflondon.go...=livevolume1&contentType=&wmName=&pageCount=1






I like the roof garden but thats about it & I dont know if that will have public access.
 
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#116 ·
14th November 2011, an application was submitted for;

"Demolition of existing structures on the site and redevelopment to provide a mixed use building of 15 storeys, plus mezzanine, lower ground and basement and an accessible roof garden to provide Class B1 office use and Class A retail uses including a restaurant at 14th floor level, together with associated public space and landscaping, motorcycle, car and bicycle parking, servicing and plant accommodation (62,643sq.m). This application is accompanied by an Environmental Statement which is available for inspection with the planning application. Copies of the Environmental Statement may be bought from DP9 at a cost of £450 (or on CD free of charge) as long stocks last. | Land Bounded By Fenchurch Street, Fen Court, Fenchurch Avenue & Billiter Street (120 Fenchurch Street) London EC3 "

Pending consideration, but looks like demo could be starting soon.

http://www.planning2.cityoflondon.g...ils.do?activeTab=summary&keyVal=LUNSUXFH0K900
 
#118 ·
It was a shit proposal when I commented on this three years ago, it remains a shit-looking proposal now, and if, as unfortunately I suspect, it goes up eventually, it will look...shit!

but hey, it's modern!

...
 
#121 · (Edited)
It seems there are only two option put on the table when it comes to city planning. 1. A beautiful rich city or the other the complete opposite 2.fast and cheap commercially driven, destroy and rebuild.

Option 2 this is what’s happening at present, seems to be driven by tax cuts.
All well and good but the winds could change quickly. What would the city look like and what would this generation or next generation inherit.

No other option, how about.

Option 3 is the same as 2 but with unbreakable conservatism and common sense philosophy.
 
#126 ·
Typical really, the City long ago gave up its cohesive historical streetscapes in favor of disjointed modern architecture ranging from iconic to embarrassingly shite. This development continues the theme (adding to the shite I might add). Do people in the City realize how bad developments like this make the urban environment? Dark and a million shades of grey is where the City's headed...

If your gonna build modern just put a slender skyscraper in you arseholes!!!! = reduced footprint, increased floorspace, better public realm, better skyline, BETTER CITY! groundscrapers suck balls, always have, always will.
 
#127 ·
London (in fact the UK) have always been obsessed with groundscrapers. Its a cultural thing we have - a cop out of sorts pandering to planners and heritage committees. There is also a strange public feeling that skyscrapers are somehow bad, a hangover from the estates of the 60s and 70s which helped to demon-ise them. This is just continuing the theme.

I can count numerous examples of ugly groundscrapers all along the Thames, which no one ever seems to register, but as soon as a building sticks its head and shoulders above the rooftops, controversy usually follows.
 
#130 ·
We moved in here nearly two years ago, fully aware of the situation, on a fifteen month contract. That has obvioulsy run out now and we're on six month rolling contract, meaning we will be given six months notice to leave.

No notice has yet been given so it's at least six months before we will be leaving.

All of this of course means rent in this building is ridiculously cheap :cheers:
 
#132 ·
I don't think anything is going to happen on this building in the near future. The landlord is currently paying to have all of the public areas of the building redecorated and the office below ours have just spent a lot of money restyling their office. I don't think either of these would have happened if they thought this building wasnt going to be here in six months time.

Another interesting point, our building (118-119) is not owned by the same landlord as the buildings on either side which, are owned by the people responsible for this development.
 
#133 ·
Just spoken to someone in the office below ours and their contract notice period is 15 months so nobody's going anywhere for a long time.

The people who are responible for this development obviously have planning permission and consent to demolish this building but they only own the buildings on either side of ours.

Anyone know how you get permission to knock down a building you dont own or have I misunderstood what's going on?
 
#134 ·
The developer may likely have an option agreement with the current building owner to purchase the property, which is good for a fixed period of time, say 5 years.

Many developers do this so that they don't have to borrow the money to buy the building while going through the planning process which is often risky. The building owner does a deal with a developer, gets some money, and if the deal goes through - fine. If not, the building owner has made additional income without doing anything other than being willing to sell at a good price.
 
#135 ·
The only thing being built in the City with any sense of permanence is the few skyscrapers (soon to come to an end) partly because they're simply huge, and have invested in quality materials.

All the midrise, groundscraper pap will be destroyed in a few decades - and rightly so. A sense of permanence is what marks out quality buildings. These pre-fab, plastic looking swaths of cheap green glass - they don't look seriously intended to last, so people don't invest emotionally in them and end up either indifferent or despising them.

This is a general problem with modern architecture - the only straight forward solution is skyscrapers built from high quality materials which is the only expression of modern architecture guaranteed to have a comparable sense of "permanence" as say... an Edwardian portland stone construction.
 
#142 ·
Now I agree with the replacement being absolute dross (Parry is a pretty good architect so its a shame the City persuaded the developer to go from a 35' floor tower to this lump is anyone's guess) however 'only in this country remark is slightly off the mark.

You can go all over the world and see plenty of dross built post war in places that don't even have the excuse of having the shit bombed out it. The antipodeans, African cities and all over South & North America not withstanding the lack of appreciation you find in the Middle East or much of Asia are full of dross that replaced buildings equal to what is being lost here.

There is also the fact that the rest of this island site is full of post war dross that is being replaced. Now I'm not saying this one is better than that particular building but just giving some perspective.
 
#143 ·
^^
Fair points, but that doesn't justify the demolition of this.
It really irritates me that architects of smaller buildings simply don't give a toss anymore. If architects of a century ago could see what the ones today are doing, people like the fool who designed this would have to be reassembled by bloody air crash investigators.
 
#144 ·
If you have a whole island site made up of several buildings then that is their justification. In order to develop this site it requires the demo of everything on it. This is not a small building by any means but a hulking brute.

Yes its a shame this building will be lost, particularly as the replacement is pretty poor but people seem to forget that 3 to 4 very poor post war buildings will be demolished as well and instead its painted solely as City approves demolish of old gem again instead of City approves demolition of whole island block which includes some poor postwar blocks and an old City gem.
 
#145 ·
But the island could easily be redeveloped without destroying at least the façade. The façade would even add prestige to the project, but more importantly would retain some semblance of a historic street for Fenchurch as a whole. The character of the City as a whole depends on such historic gems tucked between and beneath modern glass edifices. The more of them you destroy, the more the City starts to look like it could be in Korea or the USA or at Canary Wharf or anywhere. The unique and fascinating 'London' character of the place is slowly seeping away.
 
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