London – Walkie-Talkie, Cheesegrater and The Gherkin

Blue Hour after Sunset

Blaue Stunde nach Sonnenuntergang

20 Fenchurch Street is a commercial skyscraper in London that takes its name from its address on Fenchurch Street, in the historic City of London financial district. It has been nicknamed ‘The Walkie-Talkie’ because of its distinctive shape. Construction was completed in spring 2014, and the three-floor ‘sky garden’ was opened in January 2015. The 38-storey building is 160 m (525 ft) tall, making it the sixth-tallest building in the City of London and the 12th tallest in greater London.

Designed by architect Rafael Viñoly and costing over £200 million, 20 Fenchurch Street features a highly distinctive top-heavy form which appears to burst upward and outward. The entrance floor and 34 floors of office space are topped by a large viewing deck, bar and restaurants are included on the 35th, 36th and 37th floors; these are, with restrictions, open to the public.

The tower was originally proposed at nearly 200 m (656 ft) tall but its design was scaled down after concerns about its visual impact on the nearby St Paul’s Cathedral and Tower of London. It was subsequently approved in 2006 with the revised height. Even after the height reduction there were continued concerns from heritage groups about its impact on the surrounding area. The project was consequently the subject of a public inquiry; in 2007 this ruled in the developers’ favour and the building was granted full planning permission. In 2015 it was awarded the Carbuncle Cup for the worst new building in the UK in the previous 12 months.

In July 2017 the Hong Kong food company Lee Kum Kee Groups agreed to purchase the building from Land Securities and Canary Wharf Group for £1.3 billion.

The new tower at 20 Fenchurch Street was designed by Uruguayan architect Rafael Viñoly in a postmodern style. The top-heavy design is partly intended to maximise floor space towards the top of the building, where rent is typically higher.

The building uses double- and triple-glazed panelized aluminium cladding on its exterior.

The ‘sky garden’ at the top of the building was claimed to be London’s highest public park, but since opening there have been debates about whether it can be described as a ‘park’, and whether it is truly ‘public’ given the access restrictions. The garden spans the top three floors, which are accessible by two express lifts and include a large viewing area, terrace, bar and two restaurants. Fourteen double-deck lifts (seven low-rise up to the 20th floor, seven high-rise above the 20th floor) serve the main office floors of the building.

The south side of the structure is ventilated externally to improve efficiency and decrease solar gain, whilst the east and west faces incorporate extensive solar shading. There is a southern entrance in addition to the main northern entrance set back from Fenchurch Street.

The building won the Carbuncle Cup in 2015, awarded by Building Design magazine to the worst new building in the UK during the previous year. The chairman of the jury that decided the prize, Thomas Lane, said "it is a challenge finding anyone who has something positive to say about this building", whilst a town planner at the nearby Royal Town Planning Institute described the building as "a daily reminder never to let such a planning disaster ever happen again.

During the building’s construction, it was discovered that for a period of up to two hours each day if the sun shines directly onto the building, it acts as a concave mirror and focuses light onto the streets to the south. Spot temperature readings at street-level including up to 91 °C (196 °F) and 117 °C (243 °F) were observed during summer 2013, when the reflection of a beam of light up to six times brighter than direct sunlight shining onto the streets beneath damaged parked vehicles, including one on Eastcheap whose owner was paid £946 by the developers for repairs to melted bodywork. Temperatures in direct line with the reflection became so intense that a reporter for the newspaper City A.M. was able to fry an egg in a pan set out on the ground. The reflection also burned or scorched the doormat of a shop in the affected area. The media responded by dubbing the building the "Walkie-Scorchie" and "Fryscraper".

In September 2013, the developers stated that the City of London Corporation had approved plans to erect temporary screening on the streets to prevent similar incidents, and that they were also "evaluating longer-term solutions to ensure the issue cannot recur in future". In May 2014, it was announced that a permanent awning would be installed on the south side of the higher floors of the tower.

The building’s architect, Rafael Viñoly, also designed the Vdara hotel in Las Vegas which has a similar sunlight reflection problem that some employees called the "Vdara death ray". The glass has since been covered with a non-reflective film.

In an interview with The Guardian, Viñoly said that horizontal louvre windows on the south side that had been intended to prevent this problem were removed at some point during the planning process. While he conceded that there had been "a lot of mistakes" with the building, he agreed with the building’s developers that the sun was too high in the sky on that particular day. "[I] didn’t realise it was going to be so hot," he said, suggesting that global warming was at fault. "When I first came to London years ago, it wasn’t like this … Now you have all these sunny days."

The ‘sky garden’ has been criticised since opening for the tight restrictions and advance booking requirements placed on the visiting public, and for failing to meet pre-construction expectations of the extent and quality of the "garden". Oliver Wainright, architecture critic of The Guardian, described it as "a meagre pair of rockeries, in a space designed with all the finesse of a departure lounge".

The City of London Corporation’s former chief planner, Peter Rees, who approved the structure, said: "I think calling it a sky garden is perhaps misleading. If people [are] expecting to visit it as an alternative to Kew, then they will be disappointed." In July 2015 it was reported that planners are to consider a landscape architect’s alterations to the layout, following claims it is not consistent with illustrations submitted with the original planning application. The ‘sky garden’ was a key feature in sealing approval for the building, which is situated outside the main cluster of skyscrapers in the City.

In July 2015 it was reported that the building has had an unexpected impact on wind strength at street-level. The City of London Corporation received an increased number of complaints about draughts around 20 Fenchurch Street following its completion. The Corporation’s head of design, Gwyn Richards, said: "The wind outcome at street level experienced post-construction on a number of projects differs somewhat to the conditions we were expecting from the one outlined in the planning application wind assessments."

(Wikipedia)

122 Leadenhall Street, also known as the Leadenhall Building, is a skyscraper in London that is 225 metres (738 ft) tall. It opened in July 2014 and was designed by Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners; it is known informally as The Cheesegrater because of its distinctive wedge shape similar to that of the kitchen utensil with the same name. It is one of a number of tall buildings recently completed or under construction in the City of London financial district, including 20 Fenchurch Street, The Pinnacle, and The Scalpel.

The site is adjacent to the Lloyd’s Building, also designed by Rogers, which is the current home of the insurance market Lloyd’s of London. Until 2007 the Leadenhall site was occupied by a building owned by British Land and designed by Gollins Melvin Ward Partnership, which was constructed in the 1960s. That building was demolished in preparation for redevelopment of the site. By December 2009, the site was cleared but construction had stalled. The project, initially delayed due to the financial crisis, was revived in October 2010 and Oxford Properties has co-developed the property in partnership with British Land.

In May 2013, the co-developers announced that the building was over 51% pre-let.

Designed by Richard Rogers and developed by British Land and Oxford Properties, the new Leadenhall Building is 225 m (737 ft) tall, with 48 floors. With its distinctive wedge-shaped profile it has been nicknamed the Cheesegrater, a name originally given to it by the City of London Corporation’s chief planning officer, Peter Rees, who upon seeing a model of the concept "told Richard Rogers I could imagine his wife using it to grate parmesan. [The name] stuck."

The planning application was submitted to the City of London Corporation in February 2004 and was approved in May 2005.[ In 2006 Scheme Design (RIBA Stage D) started. In a statement made to the London Stock Exchange on 14 August 2008, British Land said it was delaying the project, which was due to start in October 2010. On 22 December 2010, the developer announced the project was moving forward with contracts being signed for the 50/50 joint venture with Oxford Properties.

The new tower features a tapered glass façade on one side which reveals steel bracings, along with a ladder frame to emphasise the vertical appearance of the building. It also appears to anchor the tower to the ground, giving a sense of strength. Unlike other tall buildings, which typically use a concrete core to provide stability, the steel "Megaframe", engineered by Arup, provides stability to the entire structure and is the world’s tallest of its kind. The base features a 30m high atrium which is open to the public and extends the adjacent plaza. The flat side of the building is also encased in glass, and houses the mechanical services – in particular the elevator shafts. These have been turned into an architectural feature in a vein similar to the neighbouring Lloyd’s building – they deliberately show off the elevator machinery with bright orange painted counterweights and the actual elevator motors themselves.

This unusual design’s main drawback is the building’s relatively small floorspace (84,424 m²) for a building of its height. However, it is hoped that the slanting wedge-shaped design will have less impact on the protected sightline of St Paul’s Cathedral when viewed from Fleet Street and the west.

In July 2011, British Land and Oxford Properties announced that Laing O’Rourke was the main contractor for the works of the new Leadenhall Building. Throughout 2011, construction began with the basement floors. By December 2012, the steelwork had progressed up to the fifth mega-level, with topping out expected in February or March. The glass cladding had also begun to rise. By June 2013, the steelwork of the building was completely topped out with the glass cladding covering almost half the building.

The construction of the building was the subject of an episode of the Super Skyscrapers documentary series by the American television channel PBS in February 2014.

The development has succeeded in attracting tenants, especially in contrast to the nearby part-built Pinnacle and completed Heron Tower. In May 2011, it was announced that the lower 10 floors of the Leadenhall Building have been pre-let to insurance broker Aon, which moved its global headquarters to London from Chicago. Insurance group Amlin has also agreed terms on a 20-year lease of the 19th to 24th floors as well as the top floor, the 45th, from March 2015, for a total of 111,000 sq ft of office space.

(Wikipedia)

30 St Mary Axe (widely known informally as The Gherkin and previously as the Swiss Re Building) is a commercial skyscraper in London’s primary financial district, the City of London. It was completed in December 2003 and opened in April 2004. With 41 storeys, it is 180 metres (591 ft) tall and stands on the former sites of the Baltic Exchange and Chamber of Shipping, which were extensively damaged in 1992 by the explosion of a bomb placed by the Provisional IRA in St Mary Axe, the street from which the tower takes its name.

After plans to build the 92-storey Millennium Tower were dropped, 30 St Mary Axe was designed by Norman Foster and Arup Group and it was erected by Skanska, with construction commencing in 2001.

The building has become an iconic symbol of London and is one of the city’s most widely recognised examples of contemporary architecture.

(Wikipedia)

20 Fenchurch Street ist ein Hochhaus in der Fenchurch Street in der City of London. Es wird angesichts seiner Form auch als The Walkie-Talkie bzw. The Pint (engl.: das Bierglas) bezeichnet. Ursprünglich war eine Höhe von 200 m geplant; diese wurde jedoch aufgrund der Nähe zur St Paul’s Cathedral und dem Tower of London auf 160 m reduziert. Im Jahr 2015 wurde das Gebäude mit dem Carbuncle Cup ausgezeichnet, einem Preis für das hässlichste Gebäude, das in den letzten zwölf Monaten im Vereinigten Königreich fertiggestellt wurde.

Auf der obersten Etage des Hochhauses befindet sich eine für die Öffentlichkeit zugängliche große Aussichtsplattform, inmitten derer sich außerdem die Sky Gardens befinden.

Das Vorgängergebäude war ein 25-stöckiges Hochhaus des Architekten William H. Rogers, erbaut 1968. Es war eines der ersten Hochhäuser in der City of London.

Das Gebäude wurde vom uruguayischen Architekten Rafael Viñoly entworfen.

Nach oben hin vergrößern sich stetig die Flächen der Stockwerke, sodass die oberste Etage weit über den Grundriss des Gebäudes hinausragt. Hierdurch wird eine Maximierung der Flächen der oberen Etagen ermöglicht, die höhere Mieteinnahmen als die unteren generieren. Da nur die Südseite von direktem Sonnenlicht getroffen wird, ermöglicht eine Belüftung der Fassade eine effiziente Klimatisierung des Gebäudes, während West- und Ostseite weitestgehend im Schatten liegen.

Die Krümmung der Glasfassade hatte während der Bauzeit zur Folge, dass reflektierte Sonneneinstrahlung an bestimmten Stellen in der Umgebung so stark gebündelt auftrat, dass z. B. Kunststoff an geparkten Autos beschädigt wurde. Daher wurden mehrere Parkplätze gesperrt. Daraufhin wurden auf der Südseite Lamellen angebracht, die Sonnenlichtreflexionen verhindern. Ein ähnliches Problem tritt beim ebenfalls von Rafael Viñoly entworfenen Hotel Vdara in Las Vegas auf.

Der dreistöckige botanische Garten „Sky Garden“ auf dem Dach ist Londons höchster öffentlicher Park. Der Zutritt ist gratis, aber es ist eine Voranmeldung nötig.

(Wikipedia)

122 Leadenhall Street, auch einfach Leadenhall Building genannt, ist ein Hochhaus mit einer Höhe von 225 m im Londoner Finanzbezirk der City of London. Sein keilförmiges Aussehen verlieh dem Gebäude im Volksmund den Namen Cheesegrater (englisch für Käsereibe). Das Leadenhall Building ist der drittgrößte Wolkenkratzer Londons. Betrachtet man die Höhe mit Antenne, so misst der Heron Tower 230 m und verdrängt das Leadenhall Building auf Platz vier. Das Hochhaus bietet Büroflächen für namhafte Unternehmen wie Aon oder den Versicherungskonzern Amlin. Auch das Architekturbüro Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners, welches selbst für den Bau des Wolkenkratzers verantwortlich zeichnet, verlegte seinen Sitz in das 14. Stockwerk des Gebäudes.

(Wikipedia)

30 St Mary Axe, häufig The Gherkin genannt (englisch für Gewürzgurke), ist ein 180 m hoher Wolkenkratzer im Finanzbezirk der City of London. Er wurde als Büroturm des Rückversicherers Swiss Re erbaut und ist deshalb auch als Swiss Re Building oder Swiss Re Tower bekannt.

Das Gebäude wurde 2001 bis 2004 durch die Architekten Ken Shuttleworth und Norman Foster an der Stelle der durch einen IRA-Anschlag zerstörten Baltic Exchange errichtet. In seiner äußeren Form ähnelt es dem etwa zeitgleich in Barcelona erbauten Torre Agbar.

Das 41-stöckige Gebäude wurde im April 2004 bezogen. Für den vom österreichischen Stahlbauunternehmen Waagner Biró realisierten Bau wurden 10.548 Tonnen Stahl verwendet. Das Tragwerk besteht aus ineinander verschlungenen Helixsträngen, einer Art Schlauchgeflecht. Aus dieser Formgebung folgt eine Verkleidung gänzlich bestehend aus dreieckigen und rautenförmigen Glaselementen.

Besonderen Wert legten Bauherrschaft und Konstrukteure auf Nachhaltigkeit und Energieeffizienz. Die Gesamtfläche des Gebäudes beträgt 47.310 m². Die Büroflächen überziehen nicht den ganzen Innenraum, sondern sind ringförmig angelegt. Der Kern des Gebäudes versorgt die einzelnen Etagen mit Energie und Wasser. Deckplatten und eckige Fenster öffnen und schließen sich je nach Außenwitterung, von Computeranlagen gesteuert. Es gibt Atrien über bis zu sechs Stockwerke, die für eine naturähnliche Ventilation sorgen. Die Klimatechnik ist nur bei extremen Wetterverhältnissen aktiv.

Der Film Basic Instinct 2 aus dem Jahr 2006 spielt zu großen Teilen im 30 St Mary Axe. In Match Point aus dem Jahr 2005 (Regie: Woody Allen) hat die Hauptfigur Chris Wilton sein Büro im 30 St Mary Axe. Ebenso befindet sich das Büro des Wertpapierhändlers Max Skinner im Film Ein gutes Jahr in der „Gherkin“. Auch am Anfang von Harry Potter und der Halbblutprinz ist der Turm kurz zu sehen. In der Episode Der blinde Banker der englischen Miniserie Sherlock wird das Gebäude mehrfach gezeigt, so auch von der Balkonperspektive von oben. Im Film Thor – The Dark Kingdom rutschen Thor und der Antagonist Malekith während eines Kampfes die Glasfassade des Gebäudes herunter.

Im Dokumentarfilm Building The Gherkin spielt das Gebäude selbst die Hauptrolle. Der Film begleitet den gesamten Entstehungsprozess von 30 St Mary Axe von 1999 bis 2005.

Die Zukunft des Gebäudes und sein schließlicher Zusammenbruch nach einem fiktiven Verschwinden der Menschheit wird in Folge 3 der 2. Staffel der Dokufiktion-Serie Zukunft ohne Menschen („Die Wiege der Zivilisation“, USA 2010) behandelt.

(Wikipedia)

Posted by Michael.Kemper on 2023-12-12 20:38:53

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