Establishing a new ‘Town Square’ for Waterloo Station that serves as a public transport interchange space, improves permeability within the area, and provides space for new development.
Situated between the UK’s busiest railway station and Europe’s largest cultural quarter at the South Bank, including the Royal Festival Hall, Hayward Gallery, British Film Institute, and the National Theatre, Elizabeth House will be the first major commercial development in Waterloo and Lambeth’s biggest office investment in 40 years. The South Bank area of London, flanked by the London Bridge and Waterloo Station transport hubs, has a unique mixture of cultural, commercial and residential spaces.
The design proposal for Elizabeth House represents the integration of three concepts – fitting into the townscape of the South Bank, a new face for Waterloo station, and a series of open spaces that reconnect previously disparate areas at the heart of Waterloo. It takes the form of two new buildings, separated by a large public square, which forms part of a large new civic space running the length of the site.
A new urban quarter and forecourt to Waterloo Station avoids the commercial conflict of internal floor space and the corresponding external public realm and creates a raised building form to generate an active and highly permeable streetscape. The ground floor spaces are freed to be shaped by their proximity to the Station occupied by cultural activities from the neighbouring arts centres.
Client
Chelsfield, London & Regional Properties Ltd.
Partners
David Chipperfield Architects, Arup, Space Syntax,
DP9, Montagu Evans, Davis Langdon
Imagery
© West 8
