Work begins at 100 Bishopsgate site

Demolition makes way for construction of new City office tower

Article posted: 15 May 2011

Demolition experts Keltbray have begun work on the site of 100 Bishopsgate to make way for the construction of new office space in the City of London, just across the road from the recently completed Heron Tower.

Existing buildings are being demolished in phase one of a project which will result in a 1,176 ft high office tower designed by Allies and Morrison for joint venture Brookfield and Great Portland Estates.

The property companies will not be going ahead with construction straight away however, and are seeking a pre-let in order to proceed, unwilling to develop speculatively despite predictions that the City is facing a shortage of Grade A accommodation over the next few years.

100 Bishopsgate is a mixed-use development providing 825,000 sq ft of net lettable space in three new buildings, including a forty-storey tower within the emerging cluster of tall buildings in the City. The scheme comprises office space, trading floors, a new Livery Hall for the Leathersellers' Company, a public library and retail space.

A new public square will be created at the heart of the site, with new routes drawn across it. The form of the tower component, generated by the transition from a parallelogram at its base to a rectangle at its top, resolves the complex geometries of the site and context. In combination with contrasting facade textures and articulated junctions repeated rotationally around the building, this transition in form lends the tower a distinctive twisting dynamic.

For breaking news relating to office space in Central London follow us on http://twitter.com/officespacenews

Posted by Jo