In his new book Iconicon: A Journey Around the Landmark Buildings of Contemporary Britain, Grindrod explores how these buildings captured national aspirations at a moment before the trauma of 9/11 and the financial crash. And we should think again about their value. Yet despite City Hall’s demotion, Grindrod argues that the building - which opened in 2002 - is one of a clutch of confident, neo-futuristic, turn-of-the-millennium UK projects that embodied a collective optimism unique to that time. ‘Prime site, looks fantastic, brilliant symbol - but it’s not big enough for the job.’ ‘The building represents the role of the London mayor in some sort of horrible way,’ he says. It took them less than 20 years to outgrow their purpose-built home.Īccording to the architectural commentator John Grindrod, City Hall is a giant glass-and-steel metaphor. But in December, its occupiers - the Mayor, the London Assembly and the Greater London Authority - deserted their glitzy £43 million headquarters for a cheaper building more than five miles east at the Royal Docks in Newham. The bulbous, Foster + Partners-designed ‘glass testicle’ - in Ken Livingstone’s words - occupies one of the best sites in the capital: Thames-side, squaring off to the Tower of London, and overlooking Tower Bridge.
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