The new concourse at King’s Cross station opens tomorrow and Rowan Moore has a piece welcoming it in the Observer. He pays tribute to the wondrous steel arch designed by John McAslan and Partners and built by the UK’s secret success story Arup but he criticizes the overall landscaping of the area and the way the new dome relates to the old classic industrial trainshed. I think he’s wrong on both counts. King’s Cross is classic London brick 19th century industrial building and the steel arch dome gives the whole another 100 years or so of life.
As for the whole site: the King’s Cross development: it is an exciting piece of landscaping, the only flaw being the inexplicable retention of ugly, gaunt tenements between St Pancras and Kings Cross, derelict and scaffolded for 10 years now. They should have been demolished. But with the landscaping of the canal, the new square between the canal and the London College of the Arts, and much more, this is the most exciting urban development in Britain today.
As for the whole site: the King’s Cross development: it is an exciting piece of landscaping, the only flaw being the inexplicable retention of ugly, gaunt tenements between St Pancras and Kings Cross, derelict and scaffolded for 10 years now. They should have been demolished. But with the landscaping of the canal, the new square between the canal and the London College of the Arts, and much more, this is the most exciting urban development in Britain today.
RSS Feed
