Archinect - News

Facebook to double its London presence with new King's Cross buildings by AHMM and Bennetts

2018-07-25T13:57:00-04:00

Facebook is doubling its presence in London by acquiring office space across two buildings in King's Cross. The 600,000 square feet (56,000 square meters) of office space will be enough for more than 6,000 workstations. [...] The expansion follows the 2017 opening of its site at Rathbone Place, which added 800 jobs and opened its first in-house incubator program for startup businesses. It also has a location on Brock Street.

Considerably ramping up its workplace capacity by 611,000 sq ft in soon-to-be post-Brexit London, Facebook will be moving into new buildings at King's Cross: 11 and 21 Canal Reach, designed by Bennetts Associates, the ten and twelve-story-buildings already have detailed planning permission, as well as the nine-story-structure P2 by 2015 Stirling-Prize winning Allford Hall Monaghan Morris (AHMM) with a pending reserved matters planning application.

11 and 21 Canal Reach by Bennetts Associates. Image: King's Cross.

"The deal comes just weeks after Samsung Electronics announced an agreement to open ‘Samsung KX LDN’, a 20,000 sq ft showcase space at Coal Drops Yard, the new Heatherwick Studio-designed shopping and lifestyle district in King’s Cross, in October," reads a King's Cross statement.

The new offices are expected to open in 2021.

White Collar Factory; AHMM’s Office of the Future

2017-09-06T06:30:00-04:00

Overlooking Silicon Roundabout in London's tech city is the newest and most progressive project of AHMM. Over the past 20 years, they have worked with developer giant, Derwent, in researching the ideal office environment, and White Collar Factory is the result of 8 years of this partnership. Not only did the team build on their experience and research over the past decades, but they went as far as to set up a 325sqm ‘slice’ of the White Collar Factory on site in 2013 in order to test their model for a year. The results of which informed the final designs of the main building, and encouraged buy-in from this early stage.

Photo by Tim Soar

Photo by Jasper Fry

The White Collar Factory complex comprises of six buildings, making over 27,000 sqm set around a new area of public realm. This development will be home to offices, workshops, apartments, and restaurants, to list just a few. The configuration of these volumes (a 22,900sqm new tower, and five 4-5 storey buildings) allows a public ...

A surprisingly classical look for Google's London HQ from Heatherwick Studio + BIG

2017-06-01T20:14:00-04:00

Back in 2015, the 11-storey, AHMN-designed scheme for Google's headquarters was deemed "too boring" by Google CEO Larry Page. Heatherwick Studio and BIG were brought in to add some pizazz to what was an admittedly fairly straightforward, boxy design. Today's freshly unveiled renderings show a more visually nuanced building than their predecessor, but the structure does not push design boundaries in the overt way that many associate with BIG and Heatherwick.

Indeed, the abundance of bordered, angled bay windows creates the effect of a colonnade; viewed from the exterior, the building resembles a kind of Parthenon mash-up. Floor-to-ceiling glass windows and a roof garden quickly place the building in its modern context, but this is a building that takes pains to join a conversation, not start one.

Thomas Heatherwick explained in a statement that "The area is a fascinating collision of diverse building types and spaces and I can't help but love this mix of massive railway stations, roads...

Our predictions for the Stirling Prize 2016 nominees

2016-07-13T03:45:00-04:00

It’s that time of year again…On Thursday 14th July the nominees for this years Stirling Prize will be announced. For anyone who doesn’t know the UK’s most prestigious award, it was founded in 1996 and recognises “the architects of the building that has made the greatest contribution to the evolution of architecture in the past year.”

Although the future of the industry is somewhat uncertain following the EU referendum a few weeks ago, firms have been optimistic; confident in their innovative skill and entrepreneurial ability to tackle the potential problems ahead.

Looking back over completed projects from the last year, it is clear to see why. It has been a particularly impressive year for UK projects - it was no mean feat selecting our predictions for the six nominations.

AHMM - 61 Oxford Street
Last year AHMM took first place for Burntwood School in Wandsworth. This year we think they may have a chance with 61 Oxford Street, a distinctive and contemporary landmark that takes inspirati...

Is Thomas Heatherwick designing Google's London HQ?

2015-06-15T14:03:00-04:00

Google's ambitious £1 billion King's Cross development, which will be the technology giant's European headquarters, has faced repeated delays since it was first announced back in 2013. The project currently has "no target completion date."

This news came to Business Insider via "a source close to Heatherwick", although neither Google nor Heatherwick has commented on it at this time. Heatherwick is already pinned to the expansion of Google's Mountain View headquarters, along with Bjarke Ingels of BIG. Previous designs by local firm AHMM were rejected by Google earlier this year, but it's unclear whether they'll still play a role in the design process.