THE NEW WEST END
W HOTEL LEICESTER SQUARE
Jestico + Whiles' 192-room W Hotel, being built on the site of the old Swiss Centre at the southern end of Wardour Street, is a Portland stone structure veiled in a curtain of curvaceous glass that will change colour as the light fades. It will, says architect John Whiles, `become a jewel in the necklace of light that defines the West End.'
THE ART GALLERY
TATE MODERN 2
Last March, planning consent was granted for a dazzling extension to Tate Modern, a sort of multi-faceted leaning tower clad in a lattice of perforated bricks that will allow it to glow in the dark. Designed to rise from the original power station's oil tanks for use as `raw' exhibition space, it's the work of Herzog & de Meuron, the Swiss architects responsible for the conversion of the former Bankside power station into the original Tate Modern.
THE TOWER
LONDON BRIDGE TOWER, AKA THE SHARD
This £2bn, 70-storey skyscraper is expected to be the tallest building in Europe when it tops out at a projected height of 300m. Architect Renzo Piano describes `the sharp crystal pyramid' as `like a small vertical town in which 10,000 people will work'. Prospective tenants include the hotel group Shangri-La.
THE SWIMMING POOL
THE AQUATIC CENTRE
Among the buildings rising from Europe's biggest construction site, London's Olympic Park, where up to 11,000 are expected to be working at the peak of construction, are projects by Populous (the 80,000-seat stadium) and Hopkins (the Velopark). But the most striking is without doubt Zaha Hadid's wave-like swimming pool complex, housing two 50m swimming pools and a diving pool.
THE STREETSCAPE
EXHIBITION ROAD
Nineteen million visitors every year head to Exhibition Road in South Kensington, home of the Victoria & Albert, Science and Natural History Museums. A £25m scheme by Dixon Jones aims to increase areas of `pedestrian priority' — no mere pavements, here, rather a chequerboard of dark and light granite, without kerbs — and transform the area into `a place that actively fosters cultural and environmental citizenship.'
THE URBAN VILLAGE
HERON TOWER, CITY OF LONDON
At the junction of Bishopsgate and Camomile Street, Kohn Pedersen Fox's 202m glass-and-steel tower contains 47 floors, which have been divided into 11 groups of three-storey `villages'. Each has its own atrium, which the tenant can use `as the focus of their operations'.
THE CONTROVERSY
CHELSEA BARRACKS
The site's owner, the Qatari Diar Development Company, originally chose Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners to redevelop this prime location near the King's Road. But intervention caused a rethink and in December it was announced that Dixon Jones would be taking over. However, planning consent is not expected till the end of the year.
THE MEDIA HUB
BBC BROADCASTING HOUSE
Extending the BBC's iconic 1930s radio HQ on Portland Place, the curved façade of which echoes the graceful line of the adjacent All Soul's Church, was never going to be easy. But MJP Architects' solution, in Portland stone and glass, fuses elegantly with the original structure, concealing from the outside world the futuristic 4,000sqm newsroom at its heart.
THE LANDMARK
CENTRAL ST GILES
Between Covent Garden and the eastern end of Oxford Street, Renzo Piano's 12-storey Central Saint Giles development of 109 apartments, office space, restaurants and shops, has already established itself as a London landmark — albeit a controversial one, given that its 20 angled façades are faced with ceramic cladding in garish shades of orange, green, yellow and red.
THE AIRPORT
HEATHROW TERMINAL 2
Terminal 5 may have transformed Heathrow but the airport's ongoing programme of improvement continues. Upgrades are earmarked for Terminals 3 and 4, and an entirely new Terminal 2 designed by Foster + Partners, whose most recent airport design was Beijing, is planned though won't be operational until 2019.
THE (CHEAP) PLACE TO STAY
CITY INN, TOWER OF LONDON
This small chain of inexpensive hotels really does offer luxury on a budget of not much more than £100 per night (including breakfast) at weekends: well-designed rooms, plush bathrobes, free internet access. London's Bennetts Associates, which built the Westminster and Amsterdam City Inns, is now at work on a 583-room property next to Fenchurch Street Station.
THE STATION
KING'S CROSS CENTRAL
The largest development in central London to have been approved in years, this project will create 20 new streets, ten public spaces, 2,000 homes, up to 25 office buildings, one of them by David Chipperfield, and a university. It will also restore and refurbish 20 historic buildings and structures. Among the architects involved are Wilkinson Eyre, which has designed three column-like buildings that will sit within each of the three listed gas holders, and John McAslan + Partners, which is redeveloping the station at a projected cost of £450m.
THE POWERHOUSE
RIVA HOTEL
Despite its proximity to Heathrow, the outlying London borough of Hillingdon may seem an unlikely place for a five-star hotel designed by Norman Foster, much less the capital's biggest conference hotel. But with six pavilions linked by bridges and unified by a great glass shell, the 577-room Riva promises to be exactly that.
THE GLASSHOUSE
SEAL HOUSE
Set next to the fine Greek Revival Fishmongers' Hall on the north bank of the Thames, looking towards Tower Bridge, the Pool of London and Renzo Piano's Shard, this monumental ten-storey office and retail complex trod a troubled path through the planning process amid fears that it would block views from Sir Christopher Wren's Monument to the Great Fire of London. Now revised — its top four floors reduced in size and set back from the façade, providing space for a roof garden — and consequently approved, David Chipperfield's plain yet elegant angular structure is scheduled to open in 2012.
THE REGENERATION
CARMINE AT MERCHANT SQUARE, PADDINGTON
Part of the ongoing Paddington regeneration, Carmine is an arresting 15-storey office development that will house Marks & Spencer's head office. Designed by French architects Mossessian & Partners, it consists of three aluminium-clad structures at the heart of which stands a central atrium tiled in screen-printed glass, which looks red but doesn't tint the natural light. With neighbours called Azure and Topaz, Carmine is one of six buildings on Merchant Square (three of them offices, three residential), another of which, the apartment block Waterweave, has also been designed by Mossessian.
THE APARTMENTS
ONE HYDE PARK
Among the smartest addresses in the capital, the 80 apartments in this brand new development of four ten- to 14-storey `pavilions' of glass, steel and iridescent white precast concrete are among the most expensive real estate in the capital. One fetched £100m when the first release went on sale last year. But for that you get up to 2,500sq m of a building designed by Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners, developed by Candy & Candy and serviced by Mandarin Oriental.
THE TRIANGULAR TOWERS
ARROWHEAD
Chicago skyscraper specialists Skidmore, Owings & Merrill have designed their first waterfront office development in London's Docklands, at Heron Quays. Fronted by a piazza overlooking the Thames, the towers — the highest 26 storeys and 113.5m high — look like, well, arrowheads.
THE NEW DOCKLANDS
WOOD WHARF
Most celebrated for the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, the Argentine-born, US-based architect César Pelli, now of the Connecticut practice Pelli Clarke Pelli Architects, is known in London for One Canada Square, the pyramid-topped 235m tower that defines Canary Wharf. But his proposals for a new 194m tower nearby, part of five further buildings expected to include a 134m tower by Kohn Pedersen Fox, may yet eclipse it aesthetically if not in height.
THE MUSEUM
THE BRITISH MUSEUM
Last year was a bit of an annus horribilis for Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners. Its 225m Leadenhall Building in the City stalled (pending, said developer British Land, `the design and construction proposals alongside a reassessment of the timing of delivery'), its scheme for Chelsea Barracks was abandoned, and planning consent was withheld for its 17,000sq m extension on Montagu Place. The planning process is rarely plain sailing though, and revisions are possible, so watch this space.
THE SKYSCRAPER
THE PINNACLE
Spiralling up 287m from a base that links Bishopsgate with St Mary Axe, Kohn Pedersen Fox's tower promises to be not just the tallest in the City — the Shard is outside the Square Mile — but another defining spire on the skyline.
British Airways is proud to be the official airline of the London 2012 Games. For more details, visit ba.com/london2012.
