Battersea Power Station redevelopment | Wandsworth | Pre-planning

[UrbanG]

Originally Posted by JDRS

I was hoping for something more human scale.

Oh bore me!..London is full of human scale - how refreshing it is to see a proposal which is so awesome and bold

[Jack Rabbit Slim]

Originally Posted by Medo

How did I miss this?

I really like it and agree with every word potto says.

Same here! This update completely passed me by till now, i just galnced at the title and it said 300m....bit of a shock from what I saw before. I actually quite like the design, simple, modern, nice glass funnel at the top, and I think it could actually enhance BPS and the area around it, not detract from it.

However I do understand some of the complains being pelted at it, and I think there is more chance of Will Fox appearing in an 'I love Boris Johnson' t-shirt then there is of this getting built in it's current state.

[hella good]

cool idea, although is there any chance in it being approved?

[Justme]

Originally Posted by JDRS

I was hoping for something more human scale.

I never understood this "Human scale" thing. What exactly is a building that is human scale? I would imagine a bungalow is human scale. Anything taller is certainly not on the same scale as humans. The Battersea Power Station itself with it's great hall is also far from human scale. Should we knock it down?

[Tony Resta]

Any ideas on how many floors this may have?

[randolph]

Originally Posted by Justme

I never understood this "Human scale" thing. What exactly is a building that is human scale? I would imagine a bungalow is human scale. Anything taller is certainly not on the same scale as humans. The Battersea Power Station itself with it's great hall is also far from human scale. Should we knock it down?

I agree - seems the most pointless of all arguments. One may say that a building is too big for a given area, ie a lot taller than everything around it, but 'Human scale' is a meaningless phrase when analysed.

I wonder if the argument 'not tall enough for the surrounding area' is ever used in London?

[UrbanG]

Originally Posted by randolph

I wonder if the argument 'not tall enough for the surrounding area' is ever used in London?

good point. I have often thought this. There are so many building in Ldn which are just too small and unimposing for the location but nobody seems bother with this. If there were a proposal to build 2 storey suburban semis with gardens next to BPS or small industrial units there would be no outcry. I think there is a deep seated fear of ostentatious extravagance and boldness in the country- you only have to look at all he negative stuff being written about the olympics to see that what is presented as a concern over the budget is really a fear of something which is big, bold and extravagent - and a fear that this could be the image of failure.

[wjfox]

Comments on the BBC website:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/london/content/..._gallery.shtml

[DarJoLe]

Donna Kersbergen
Total, unrelenting ugliness. Why be like all the other ugliness in the world? Can't London be brave and do something original? These plans are awful and remind me of similarly hideous shopping centres in South-East Asia; nothing London about it at all. Pity.

I do pity some people I really do.

[Zenith]

So do I. I love how she spouts vague uninformed comments like 'Why be like all the other ugliness in the world?'. What uglyness are we talking about here?

What would be more original and brave? What would be more 'London' about it? Show me the similar shopping centres please.

I refer Donna to this comment

The striking 'chimney' will be the largest solar driven natural ventilation system ever conceived and will eliminate the need for air conditioning for the commercial and ground floor retail spaces.

No nothing original and brave about that at all.

[Newcastle Guy]

Is it just me imagining things, or have the plans actually recieved a suprisingly warm response? I expected all-out opposition from all corners.

[r-g-b]

I caught the section about it on the BBC London news the other day which seemed to be very positive, even the people in the street had nothing bad to say about it.

[JDRS]

Originally Posted by Justme

I never understood this "Human scale" thing. What exactly is a building that is human scale? I would imagine a bungalow is human scale. Anything taller is certainly not on the same scale as humans. The Battersea Power Station itself with it's great hall is also far from human scale. Should we knock it down?

By human scale I didn't mean something low-rise. Quite the contrary. I'd be happy to see high density buildings and a skyscraper here. My concern was with the concept of an enormous eco-dome plonked into London and large units with little variety and scale. Also, the proposal should ideally compensate Battersea Power Station and not detract from it.

Anyway I'm still undecided as yet and the more I look at the renders and scheme the more I like it.

[Astounded]

Battersea Power Stations Reception

Published on 22-06-2008 by James Newman

With the smoke now settling on Rafael Vinoly's brave redesign of Battersea Power Station that includes a 300 metre tall hollow glass tube with flats wrapped around the outside, just how has his vision been greeted?

As pro development as ever the Financial Times writer, Edwin Heathcote, is a welcoming voice, describing it as "among the most extraordinary proposals I have ever seen for the city and has chutzpah enough to compete with one of London's most familiar and eccentric structures."

Despite coming from the same publisher as the Evening Standard, The Daily Mail concentrates on the historical aspects of the site and calls it a "masterplan to save Battersea Power Station before it collapses was unveiled today" noting somewhat sensationally that the £4 billion proposals are "likely to be the last chance to save the world famous "cathedral of industry" with its four white chimneys."

Yes, the power station is in ruinous form and little better than a hollowed-out shell with rotting chimneys plonked on top, but the developer will be spending £150 million keeping it standing regardless of what happens to their proposals which is one thing those who care about preservation can draw some reassurance from.

There is no such praise is to be found in it's sister paper, the Evening Standard. Architecture writer Rowan Moore brands the scheme "a towering affront to common sense" and uses words and phrases like iconic and zero carbon in inverted commas to imply otherwise.

Moore even Suggests that perhaps the scale of the project is due to the developer and architect driven insane in an X-Files like manner by spooky deposits in the ground - "Some industrial poison lurking in the Battersea soil, which causes its owners to lose any sense of proportion and propose ideas like the theme park and the shopping-mall-cum-acrobatic-performance-space".

Moore goes even further seeing the opportunity to use the historic building as a political ping-pong ball. "Tower-sceptic Mayor Boris Johnson and his planning advisor Sir Simon Milton, for whom this is surely the perfect opportunity to prove their mettle." Of course, refusing planning permission is something that would thrill the usually anti-high-rise paper.

Moore isn't alone in his views. Ex RIBA president George Ferguson has lashed out at Vinoly's design and branded the architect "major menace to London". He's clearly neither a fan of this, nor 20 Fenchurch Street, both of which are unconventional compared to contemporary buildings.

It's a sentiment that others will obviously share, no doubt crawling out of the woodwork in the next few weeks to make their opposition very clearly known. Anything less and pigs will fly.

My opinion?

[ismail]

WPW, WOW, WOW

I'm away from London for a couple of days and this happens.

Why didn't we see this comming.


It's FAAANTASTIC and a 1000footer

Simon Milton must have been physically sick when he saw this. Fortunately it's so big it will have to go to PI, so caveman Boris and his bum chum Milton won't have too much of a say on it's final outcome.

God I hope it gets the go ahead, apart from the ES ( no surprise there) it's liked by most people

[RoryT]

how fooking unbelievably cool is this! massive redevelopment with that 300m chimney!

cant see the 'ecodome' being built though

[wjfox]

http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/art/2008...sea_tower.html




Could it be ... Battersea tower station?

A 300m-high edifice is the latest proposal to transform south London's crumbling power station. Will it ever get off the ground?

Is it all blarney? The latest in a long line of redevelopment schemes for Battersea power station, one of Britain's most famous abandoned buildings, announced today by the Irish property tycoons Johnny Ronan and Richard Barrett, is certainly the most ambitious.


While the Art Deco power station is to be converted into the inevitable shopping mall, it will be twinned with a huge office complex naturally ventilated by a transparent, 300m-high funnel rising from an enormous transparent dome. This, says Rafael Vinoly, the New York-based Uruguayan architect in charge of the design, will cool the giant new building below so effectively that it won't need air conditioning. Blocks of flats housing thousands as well as fashionable shops would complement this highly unusual and extraordinarily dramatic office complex.

The tower would be one of the two tallest buildings in London, rivalling Renzo Piano's up-and-coming London Bridge Shard, but its sheer scale is premised on the construction of a spur of the Northern line of the Underground. Without it, the power station will feel as cut-off as it always been. Whether Mayor Boris Johnson and Transport for London will fall for the intriguing logic of the scheme, and a bit of Irish and Latin American charm, remains to be seen.

Redevelopment schemes have come and gone since this imperious building was finally decommissioned in 1983. Developers, however, while forced to dream up a workable future for the Grade II*-listed ruin, have really had their eyes on the huge amount of land around this erstwhile Thamesside temple of power. Think of all the bling shops and City slicker flats (sorry, "exclusive, luxury river-view apartments") that could be squeezed onto the site. And at what profit.

And, yet, to date, the power station has thwarted all comers. There is no doubt that the building is a major challenge to architects and developers alike, while the site remains distant from the rest of central London. Unlike its sibling, Bankside, slap-bang opposite St Paul's Cathedral and now the hugely popular tourist magnet we know as Tate Modern, Battersea is somewhat out on a limb. And perhaps it always looked at its best from a distance, especially when seen through the windows of trains rumbling across bridges and viaducts, or from boats on the Thames itself.

The power station was an Art Deco masterpiece, with a cinematic interior designed by Giles Gilbert Scott and built between 1929 and 1955. It was closed in two phases, as its pair of magnificent steam turbines spun for the last time, in 1975 and 1983. Margaret Thatcher's "favourite businessman", Sir John Broome, owner of Alton Towers, the Staffordshire theme park, promised to turn it into a similar visitor attraction, but things went pear-shaped and, having stripped the historic building of its roof, he sold it on to the Hong Kong property tycoon Victor Hwang.

Wang's Parkview company came up with two schemes, one designed by Nicholas Grimshaw, architect of the Waterloo International Eurostar terminal (now abandoned) and the Eden Project in Cornwall. This was succeeded by a glamorous proposal led by Cecil Balmond, the Arup engineer, and boasted such wonders as a rooftop hotel designed by Ron Arad with rooms linked by tube-like shuttles. It was wondrous stuff, but it was hard to believe it would ever happen. It didn't.

Hwang sold on to Ronan and Barrett, whose project is so ambitious that even they talk of a completion date of 2020. They also talk of "carbon neutrality", but as every new building development in London is said to be "sustainable" today, it is hard to know.

Vinoly is an interesting architect, and Ronan and Barrett ambitious developers; even then, I can't help feeling that this project is more than a little over-the-top. If only someone could turn the hulk into either London's first truly green power station, or perhaps transform it into a museum of science and technology (think of all the room inside). They could still build the best new publicly owned housing estate in London, and add a few good shops - oh, and a regular riverbus to central London.

But this latest scheme, though not altogether hot air, is still a design too far. Back to the drawing board, I'm afraid.




Comments


BarryBeatmaster

Parkview had the idea of putting a one-table, hydraulically-raised restaurant in one of the chimneys.

I don't believe any of these far-fetched plans are anything more than stalling for time until the power station collapses
due to decay, and the land price rises.
that's what Parkview did for 10 years.

they've already got the permission to demolish the chimneys, supposedly to rebuild them.


MarkHooper

What a horrible way to revive one of London's best landmarks - completely dwarf it with something else


Highby

There is the colour green missing on the picture. I think they should simply let the time taking its way. If they do nothing trees will grow there, and flowers and grass and the animals will find good caves. And in a few hundreds of years the archaeologists will have a good place for the research.


Highby

... wasn't there any architect in Moscow lately who wanted to build a huge transparent dome too? A whole city under a dome?

[Octoman]

Somone on the radio last night having a whinge about this. When they were describing it to listeners so they could imagine its appearance they said to imagine a giant bong or a crack pipe. Lovely.

I think it looks fantastic personally.

[johnt_gr]

The 1000 ft chimney looks fantastic and very futuristic! London should really build this thing!

[Manuel]

the project looks promising...too ambitious for London? I guess so. But I certainly would favour almost anything to save the power station.