The Gherkin, the "dildo that dots the skyline"
Battersea Reach
St. George Wharf
The MI6 Headquarters
Harrod's Villages
The "effing" GLA Building
Posted on 01/27/2008 4:50:10 AM PST by canuck_conservative
To follow up on the highly successful Ugliest Buildings in New York According to the Experts, last year I solicited opinions from some of London's top architects about the monstrosities in their own city. For various reasons (time constraints, few and wordy responses), we didn't run the piece. But looking back months later, I've realized this is some real gold gathering the proverbial dust in my inbox -- rife with biting commentary, insightful observations, and pure hatred for Norman Foster. So without further ado, I present some of London's most promising architects' answers to the question, "What is the ugliest building in London?" Though many mention the ego-driven ugliness that dots the skyline (the Gherkin for example) the biggest offenses seems to come from lazy and uninspired projects. And almost everyone mentioned the ugliness of St. George Wharf and Tower.
Sam Jacob, founding director of Fashion, Architecture, Taste: "So many London buildings move from 'ugliness' to 'beauty' through changes in attitude over time. Many of the ugliest buildings are now assimilated; they become part of the city's narrative. Having said that, there are some right architectural howlers. Take the Nat West Tower-- that's a pretty ugly concept, however excused by its ridiculousness and its facile commercial brutalism. There are places like the Elephant and Castle-- massive modernist conglomerations of traffic planning and housing that certainly lack genteel appeal.
Ugliness however, isn't an aesthetic. It's about a mean-ness, a lack of generosity. In urban planning terms, a grabbing of public resource for private gain. And there are two candidates for this crown, both on the stretch of riverfront from Vauxhall to Wandsworth: St. George Wharfand Battersea Reach (pictured), both from developer St. George. These are yuppie ghettos, bought off-plan on the back of buy-to-let mortgages. Designed from the brochure outwards, they bristle with balconies that rubber-neck the river. It's not their venal maxing out of volume that's the problem. Or the crashing together of economic circumstance (cheap loans, post-industrial rehabilitation, exponential rise in property value). It's the fact that it tries to look nice. That it does 'architectural' things (a touch of modernism, a little dash of High Tech, a dose of Pomo). It's their desire to please that is so despicable. They capture an anemic, generic marketing-led reductiveness. If James Blunt were a building, he'd be these. If they were food, they'd be coffee-chain sandwiches."
Ali Mangera, co founder Mangera Yvars Architects: "Worst building is the Effra [St. George Wharf] site in Vauxhall (pictured) -- the set of buildings next to MI5 HQ on the Thames. Truly monstrous."
Tom Holbrook, co-founder 5th Studio: "Ugliest in London -- and such a lot to choose from! Negatives? Along the river is the place to see corkers - almost anything by Terry Farrell for example -- the MI6 headquarters at Vauxhall Cross (pictured), Charing Cross Station -- although his air vents for the Blackwall tunnel are very nice. The whole of Canary Wharf is a triumph for uglyism. Good ugly? One of my all time favorites -- the bonkers neo-Aztec Hayward Gallery."
Ben Brandt, The Rat and Mouse: "If you'd prefer to feature famous buildings/London landmarks, my vote would be for Buckingham Palace -- a drab, (ironically) Stalinist-looking slab of monochrome with all the warmth of a prison cellblock or (less ironically) the Royal Family. It doesn't compare well to Paris' royal palaces.
But if you want to know what really offends me ... it's not the famous landmarks at all. What I really loathe is the entirely un-extraordinary everyday planning that goes on around here and results in the foul mock-Edwardian apartment buildings springing up along the Thames, in the west of London around Hammersmith, Chiswick, and Barnes. They've no character whatsoever. They're not even depressing. They're like depression laced with Prozac. So, to sum them all up, can I vote for Harrods Village(pictured)? When I first moved to London, the Harrods Furniture Depository was this lovely grand building on the Thames, mysterious and (I think) disused. As the foul riverside apartments began to spring up around it, it was clear that sooner or later it was going to be converted. The worst happened. It wasn't just converted, it was built around. The website describes it as being 'cleverly integrated with new build apartments and townhouses.' There's nothing clever about it, and you learn from experience that when British planners talk about 'townhouses,' it's going to be horrible. It is not just a criminal ruination of a once-lovely building, now a gated community for the tasteless and conscienceless, but a symbol of all that's wrong with contemporary British planning."
Patrick Lynch, founder Lynch Architects: Broadway Malayan at Vauxhall... Also, the dwarf with the tits that Foster built next door to his office. That fugly office building between City Road and the Barbican-like decon goes tropical sci-fi without even pretending to do Ken Yeaung bogus-green style. The Foster block on Finsbury Square -- stone-clad columns that somehow don't even have the grace of concrete ones. The effing GLA (pictured), a very irritated jockstrap, full of very hot angry office workers. The Tower of London. It has all the charm of a Protestant pike-staff.
Battersea Reach
St. George Wharf
The MI6 Headquarters
Harrod's Villages
The "effing" GLA Building
What would Howard Roark say? Or Ellworth Toohey?
That last one looks like a silicone breast implant that’s become unanchored.
"Bring me more dynamite!"
Harrod’s Villages - that’s ugly.
I think that Harrod’s Villages are much better than the others. Also there is quite an anti free market attitude in a lot of these remarks.
These buildings are UGLY.
St. George Wharf looks like a bunch of owls.
I don’t see anything wrong with Harrods Village or M16 HQ.
In the remarks of FReepers? You must be joking. Noting that a building is f&cking ugly is hardly "anti free market".
No -- In the source article. Most of them look ghastly to me.
MI6 Headquarters is also known as Legoland. Fittingly, it looks to me like a prison gone awry.
Oh. Well, nevermind. :-)
I like Harrod’s Villages as well, but that is due to the fact that I don’t even see anything that new and nice around here. I am sure in London that there are far better looking buildings that have the same function.
The GLA building looks like it “slipped” during construction and they just shored it up and continued.
More ivy, please!
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