Environmental Study
Original Study
- Background & Introduction
- Buildings - Facade
- King Street - South
- King Street - North East
- King Street - North West
- Henrietta Street - South
- Henrietta Street - North
- Market Building - West and East
- Market Building - North and South
- The Piazza - West and East
- The Piazza - North
- The Piazza - South
- South Elevation/ Russell Street
- East Elevation to James Street/East Piazza
- Russell Street/Part Bow Street Elevation
- Russell Street - North and South
- Southampton Street - West
- Southampton Street - East
- James Street - West
- James Street - East
- Buildings
- Space between buildings
- Management & Implementation
East Elevation to James Street / East Piazza
The proposals for the James Street elevation and Piazza illustrate the architectural approach for the development, aimed at breaking down each facade into elements, while providing an overall unity of form and materials. Although it maybe in the spirit of Clutton's successful approach for the Bedford Estate, the effect created seems likely to be an awkward contrast. This will be particularly obvious in long views across James Street, looking south to the Piazza, across James Street from Bedford Chambers to the east Piazza facades and across Russell Street from the east end of the Market Building.
JAMES STREET ELEVATION
The junction between the successful Classical form of the 1980s GMW Royal Opera House Extension and the proposed retail units includes a ground level entrance, conical feature and dark slot of glazing. The ground floor retail units have a stone clad elevation above with single proportions. However, the modem glazing without glazing bars, increasing the impression of blank staring eyes, and the extent of ground floor display windows makes the building look top heavy. Detailed design of the shopfronts is essential to avoid the problems identified in the recent treatment of the ground floor of the GMW scheme. As with the Russell Street elevation, the coat of arms on the end of the arcade should be carefully illuminated - the point where the new Royal Opera House development would link to the 198Os extension.
EAST PIAZZA ELEVATION
This adopts the form of the other principal Piazza elevation and the previous comments apply. In addition, it is worth restating for the record a selection of the comments of architectural commentator, Dan Cruckshank: “...The wavering between historic precedent and invention is most strikingly demonstrated in the design for the Piazza, where the architects have reproduced the famed, but long lost Inigo Jones composition in a way that defies not just Jones and local precedent but the English classical tradition as well. Jones’s Piazza buildings were arcaded, built mostly of brick and with small windows set over large ones. In Dixon’s design the ground floor is colonnaded (copied from the Uffizi in Florence, not Jones), all is faced with stone and, oddest of all, tall windows are set over squat windows...”