Archinect - News

London’s Battersea Power Station hosts giant Christmas tree animation by artist David Hockney

2023-12-06T13:10:00-05:00

The world-renowned artist David Hockney has lit up London’s iconic Battersea Power Station with a giant installation resembling two Christmas trees. Titled ‘Bigger Christmas Trees’ and set on the station’s two north-facing 328-foot-tall chimneys, the animation will be on display from December 1st until Christmas Day, December 25th.

“Battersea Power Station is such a beautiful building, I wanted to decorate it in a way that I hoped would bring joy and hope to Londoners,” said Hockney about the scheme.

Image credit: Apple

The 10-minute animation was designed by Hockney on an iPad using a digital pencil; an appropriate method given that Battersea Power Station currently houses Apple’s UK headquarters.

In June, we reported on the opening of Foster + Partners’ Apple Store within the station, marking the company’s 40th store in the United Kingdom. Late last year, meanwhile, we covered a review of the newly completed WilkinsonEyre interior spaces in the station alongside a Frank Gehry-desig...

Foster + Partners' newest Apple Store opens at Battersea Power Station in London

2023-06-21T18:24:00-04:00

Apple has officially opened the doors to its newest store in the UK, located at London’s iconic Battersea Power Station, which has undergone an extensive overhaul to convert the building from a former coal-fired power station to a high-end shopping, commercial and residential development.

The Foster + Partners-designed storefront is located on the first floor of the Battersea Power Station, which opened last fall, and marks Apple’s 40th store in the United Kingdom. The Station is also the site of the tech company’s new UK headquarters, which will house 3,000 employees in 500,000 square feet worth of office space.

Image courtesy Apple

As stated by Apple in a news release, the newly opened store was built with universal design principles with the aim of making it an inviting and accessible space. This is reflected through its access routes for wheelchair users, enhanced visual and acoustic clarity, expanded assisted listening systems, as well as its varied table and seating heights.

Image courtesy Apple

Additionally, the company says Apple Battersea is operationally carbon-neutral and runs entirely on renewable energy.

'Here, the architecture wins': Rowan Moore on the inside-out quality of the newly-completed Battersea Power Station

2022-10-11T09:00:00-04:00

The project as whole also creates a highly managed territory of the sort that you tend to get in single-owner developments which, despite some funky moves by a Frank Gehry-designed apartment block, is fundamentally predictable. It threatens to cage the beast that is Gilbert Scott’s masterpiece, as might the array of retail logos inside. But, between the blandscape outside and the brandscape within, the power station is cussed enough to assert its own character.

The £9 billion final boss of Greater London adaptive reuse projects (along with the Barbican) is a story of inside and out for Moore, who sees the program’s housing element as an “awkward” mismatch when compared to WilkinsonEyre’s tastefully “sober” and restrained interior retail spaces that come dotted with “outbreaks of cautious fantasy.”

View this post on Instagram A post shared by WilkinsonEyre (@wilkinsoneyre)

The Observer critic also opined that it does offer a “striking contrast” to the mixed architecture of nearby Vauxhall and Nine Elms, adding its survival can be attributed to the growing influence of heritage considerations in British planning schemes. “If only some of the thoughtfulness applied to old buildings could be applied to the planning of new ones,” he lamented, “we might be getting somewhere.”

Battersea Power Station site closure extended until end of April

2020-04-01T21:02:00-04:00

Work on the giant Battersea Power Station redevelopment site will not restart until the end of April at the earliest. Construction was paused last week on the scheme where Mace and Sir Robert McAlpine are main contractors on phase two and three. But an update from Battersea Power Station Development Company boss Simon Murphy has clarified the client’s position.

As COVID-19 health precautions are being tightened in the UK, London's in-progress Battersea Power Station megadevelopment also just extended its temporary site closure through the end of April.

The delay impacts construction progress on the $11 billion project master-planned by Rafael Viñoly Architects and featuring buildings and exterior spaces designed by BIG, Gehry Partners, Foster + Partners, James Corner Field Operations, and LDA Design.

Rendering of the completed Battersea Power Station development.

"Following the temporary closure of the site last week we have concluded that, in light of the government requirements and guidelines, the site should remain closed for the next few weeks," reads a statement published by Simon Murphy, CEO of the Battersea Power Station Development Company.

"We will review the position again on 17 April and if deemed appropriate to reopen, mainsite works would recommence on 27 April. In this period the only people working on site will...

Apple plan to open a huge campus in London’s Battersea Power Station

2016-09-28T12:31:00-04:00

Apple will open a mega-campus inside London’s Battersea Power Station in a major boon for the developers behind the Grade II-listed building’s regeneration. The tech giant will take over 500,000 sq ft of the power station’s Boiler House, spanning six floors. Around 1,4000 staff are expected to move into the Apple campus in 2021.

Take a look back at Archinect's coverage of the Battersea Power Station development:

First images of BIG’s Malaysia Square in London’s Battersea Power Station

2014-12-03T19:16:00-05:00

The first images of Bjarke Ingels Group's public square [officially titled Malaysia Square] for the £8 billion Battersea Power Station redevelopment in London have been revealed just a few weeks after BIG was appointed as the competition-winning designer. The public square, which will be BIG's first U.K. project, is only a part of the Battersea Power Station's redevelopment plan.

Head over to Bustler for more details.

BIG appointed to design public square for revamped Battersea Power Station

2014-11-13T18:20:00-05:00

BIG is about to make its debut in the UK. The Architects' Journal reported that the Danish firm was selected in an international competition to design the public square in the £8 billion redevelopment of the historic Battersea Power Station, a decommissioned coal-fired power station in southwest London. A formal announcement is yet to be made.

Situated within the Rafael Viñoly-designed masterplan, BIG's public square is described as becoming the gateway to the revamped power station.

BIG, who is working alongside the Malaysian-backed Battersea Power Station Development in overseeing the design of the public square, is set to join the redevelopment project's star-studded list of architects.

Find out more on Bustler.

Frank Gehry about his Battersea Power Station project, Norman Foster, Mark Zuckerberg

2014-04-16T20:28:00-04:00

He’s waited until his ninth decade, but Frank Gehry is turning his attention to the London skyline, starting with Battersea Power Station, where he will draw on the capital’s sweeping crescents and stucco terraces as part of its £8bn redevelopment. He tells Harry Mount about courting controversy, banter with Norman Foster and working for Mark Zuckerberg

Frank Gehry unveils plans for his first buildings in England

2014-04-07T14:16:00-04:00

With titanium facades swinging like jiving skirts and windows staggered like towers of toppling coins, the chaotic energy of the latest apartment designs for Battersea power station can only mean one thing: Frank Gehry is in town. As the 85-year-old visionary architect behind the Guggenheim museum in Bilbao outlined plans for 700 apartments in London – his first English buildings – he walked straight into a raging debate about the capital's affordable housing crisis.

Previously: Gehry and Foster selected to design Phase 3 at Battersea Power Station

Gehry and Foster selected to design Phase 3 at Battersea Power Station

2013-10-23T15:00:00-04:00

On behalf of the shareholders of Battersea Power Station, Battersea Power Station Development Company announces that Gehry Partners and Foster + Partners, two of the world’s most innovative and renowned architectural practices have been chosen to design Phase 3 at Battersea Power Station. This will be architect Frank Gehry’s first building in London.

Phase 3 will be one of the most exciting areas of the Battersea Power Station development, otherwise known as the High Street. Being a retail pedestrian street it is the gateway to the entire development and the new Northern Line extension. Phase 3 will comprise two residential development zones located either side of the High Street. Both architectural practices are collaborating on the High Street; Gehry Partners is designing the residential buildings to the east of the High Street, with Foster + Partners designing the residential buildings to the west. In total, Phase 3 will comprise 1200 residential units, a 200 room hotel overlooking both the town square and the Power Station, 350,000 sq. ft. of retail and restaurant space, a 15,000 sq. ft. library and further leisure space.

Frank Gehry, founder of Gehry Partners commented;
“Gehry Partners is honored to have this wonderful opportunity to collaborate with our respected colleagues Foster + Partners on this seriously importan...

Architects imagine a Battersea Power Station rollercoaster conversion

2013-03-11T13:40:00-04:00

Even though its current owner has boring plans to turn it into flats and a shopping complex, architects can't resist imagining new uses for Battersea Power Station. Architecture firm Atelier Zündel Cristea (AZC) is the latest, rendering a future station that's both a museum of architecture and a giant rollercoaster.