London Wall Place, UK

Architect	Make Architects
Date Built	2017
Location	London Wall
Description
As Make Architects point out, "... London Wall Place is a significant City of London site. Within it lie the remains of St Alphage Church and a section of the original London Wall." They add that they have, " .... unlocked these historic structures and replaced the site’s existing buildings – a 1950s podium and a vacant tower – with a swathe of high-quality office space. ... the primary purpose of the endeavour, 500,000 sq ft of office space distributed in two blocks, one of them due to be occupied by the global asset manager Schroders. These are rendered in a vigorous style, a bit art deco in its striations of white concrete and dark tiles, a bit brutalist in the exaggeration of its projections and recessions, ...... .... the whole levitating over the bridges and gardens like a hovering Rockefeller Centre." In an article, published in the Guardian in July of 2018, Rowan Moore, reflects on the way the project has resurrected the adjacent Barbican's concept of streets in the sky by adding to and significantly enhancing the elevated pedestrian walkways. "It was central to Make’s design that the stubs and relics of the elevated walkways should be celebrated and enhanced. It turned out, among other things, that those awkward residents – the Barbican itself being the most complete fulfilment of the pedway dream – quite liked the ability to get across busy roads without having to tangle with traffic. So the architects proposed more bridges, not fewer, to help reconnect the tattered network. The new pedways are more playful and dramatic than the rational originals...... ..... They curve and wind. They duck into the shade of overhanging buildings and emerge into light, ..... .... hover over water and jump across roads. .... .... They are clad in rust-coloured pre-oxidised steel, part of a mildly fetishistic palette of materials that also includes ultra-white glass-reinforced concrete and black, ribbed expanses of faience tiling. They are wide enough to make room for benches in tropical hardwood and steel ..... – you are supposed to “dwell” there, says Sam Potter of Make, rather than just “pass through”.