Bricking it: Battersea power station primed to open to the public – ADC

Sir Giles Gilbert Scott is an architect who has birthed London three icons: the red telephone box, Bankside power station, and Battersea power station. All have been gutted and repurposed. Telephone boxes now contain defibrillators, Bankside saw its turbine hall cleared as part of its metamorphosis into the Tate Modern, and now Battersea too has had its heart restarted, as it starts life again as a new destination for Southwest London and the brick jewel of the Vauxhall Nine Elms Battersea Opportunity Area, joining the US Embassy on the south side of the Thames.

Not so long ago, the hulking mass of brick was an industrial ruin from an age where it gorged on coal and spewed out leccy, supplying the capital with power. At its peak, it chewed through 240 tons of the black stuff every hour. Today it’s fed money — £400 million from Malaysia — and gives back new offices, a shopping arcade, places to eat, drink and watch a film, as well as luxury living and returns for shareholders.

It’s remarkable, really, to see a plan for the power station actually be realised. Many before had tried and failed to take on the sleeping giant which dates back to 1927. Schemes have been in the offing since the power station was turned off in ‘83, when John Broome, the businessman behind Alton Towers, bought the site for £1.5 million in ‘87 with a view to transforming it into a theme park. That didn’t happen, and in ’93, Broome sold to Hong Kong developer Victor Hwang who employed Nicholas Grimshaw to devise a plan that incorporated a train station, circus, cinema, two hotels and luxury flats.

That didn’t happen either. In 2006 Rafael Viñoly sought to insert a huge glass tube and atrium into the building, topping it with a tennis court and swimming pool. Six years later, Chelsea FC also saw it as a sporting venue, putting forward ideas for it to be their home stadium. That same year (2012) a consortium of Malaysian investors comprising Permodalan Nasional Berhad, SP Setia, Sime Darby Property and KWSP EPF (a Malaysian pension fund) purchased the property for £400 million — the plans of which have come to fruition today.

Well, sort of. Those plans were originally drawn up in 2010 and back then were required to be 50 percent affordable housing. Now it is just nine percent, the argument being that such an amount of affordable housing wasn’t viable. Despite this, Simon Murphy, CEO of Battersea Power Station Development Company, reasons that Battersea is a destination “for the majority,” insisting there will be no “lights out London,” referring to the housing designed by Foster+Partners, dRMM and Frank Gehry among others, that encircles the former power station, as well the apartments within, designed by WilkinsonEyre. (The 386 affordable homes are being designed by Patel Taylor).

Indeed, it’s inside the belly of the beast where WilkinsonEyre has got to work. This isn’t the practice’s first foray into a Gilbert Scott building either. The firm previously turned a steelworks in Rotherham into the Magna Science Adventure Centre, and also revamped the Bodleian Library in Oxford. Both projects were shortlisted for the Stirling Prize, with the former actually winning it in 2001.

The studio was keen to play up the potential spatial drama at its fingertips: “You need a bit of void to create impact,” says founding director Jim Eyre. “It would be a crime if we didn’t reflect the history and scale,” adds fellow director, Sebastien Ricard, stressing the importance that visitors know it’s a former place of heavy-duty industry.

This wasn’t hard to achieve given the plethora of artefacts, details and architectural remnants on offer to sample and play up, acting as ghosts of the building’s past life. The difficulty, however, was including all this with the commercial and residential square metre-age demanded by the developer. What a dream it would be to carve open the former turbine halls and let patrons feast on the decaying décor. WilkinsonEyre has, just, held onto that dream — and had some fun at the same time: A rusty crane and gantry system has been kept, and from this a glass box, which will serve as a grandstand, is suspended.

That can be found in Turbine Hall B, into which the sun has been directed from above through a series of light tubes — a necessity given the original building wasn’t designed for such activities and was rather low on windows. Above, on the roof, is a garden curated by James Corner Field Operations, the landscapers behind New York’s High Line. The garden is for residents only and offers views over the river (if you’re tall enough to peek over the parapet). A better view, available to members of the public willing to part with £20, will be from the top of one of the chimneys, up which an elevator will ascend, crowning the apex of the Battersea experience-athon.

Back down in Turbine Hall A — the older of the turbine halls (‘B’ was finished in the 1950s) — daylight is less of an issue, as the inherited roof structure is more welcoming to the sun. Here, the Art Deco finishes have been preserved and restored. Completed in the early ‘30s, the hall is filled with ornate motifs of the era, most notably seen with tile-clad fluted pilasters. For a moment, you may forget this space was a giant whirring generator; how charming to give such a titan of industry such delightful decoration.

The turbine halls comprise the retail hub of the complex and shopfronts have been ensconced by bronze surrounds to protect the restored tilework. The floor also alludes to the project’s past, with brickwork outlining the footprint of the former turbine.

Above the retail levels are offices, the biggest tenant being Apple which occupies 46,000 square metres across six floors. At the heart of all this is a six-storey-high atrium which lets light in and affords views of the chimneys above. A lovingly restored switch room, open to the public (but mainly used for private events) is a must-see which looks as if it has plucked from a sci-fi set, displaying alien-like symbols above dials and knobs above which phrases such as “Carnaby Street” are emblazoned, outlining where said power is headed to.

Outside, extensive landscaping by LDA Design includes an open-air cinema/event space between the building and the waterfront. Thames boat services dock here, too. WilkinsonEyre’s original pitch for the project suggested a red carpet taking exclusive guests from the water to the power station for high-end events. (Whether that will happen remains to be seen). Extensive work has been done below the landscaping, too, with two levels for vehicles — one for cars and the other for deliveries — while mitigation for a one-in-a-hundred flood has been put in as well.

Too precious to be knocked down and too valuable to be ignored, Battersea power station is finally alive once again. It’s doors fully open on October 14^th when visitors will be able to enjoy the fruits of an arduous ordeal to bring the behemoth back after a generation or two’s worth of lost sleep.