Urban Landscape Gallery

Paternoster Square JLP01_08_067632

PATERNOSTER SQUARE, CITY OF LONDON. Looking north-east across the Paternoster development during its construction, showing completed blocks and some under construction including Sudbury House.
Work on the Paternoster development was carried out in a joint venture by John Laing Construction Limited, Trollope and Colls Limited, and George Wimpey and Company Limited. The scheme involved the redevelopment of a seven acre site on the north side of St Paul's Cathedral. The site had been almost entirely devastated during an incendiary raid in December 1940. The development consisted of a series of office blocks, a shopping precinct, an extensive piazza and a three-level car park. The various blocks were named after former Bishops of London. The tallest block was 18-storeys in height and was called Sudbury House. The three 10-storey blocks were Courtenay, Walden and Grendall Houses, and the five-storey blocks were Laud, Sheldon and Bancroft Houses

© Historic England Archive

Finsbury Avenue JLP01_10_31828

Finsbury Avenue, Broadgate, City of London. A view towards the north west corner of the newly formed Finsbury Avenue Square showing the office buildings at numbers 1, 2 and 3 Finsbury Avenue.
The Finsbury Avenue complex was a three phase speculative office development by Rosehaugh Greycoat Estates in anticipation of the deregulation of the financial markets in 1986. It aimed to entice potential tenants in the financial services industry to a fringe area on the edge of the City through high quality design and construction. Designed by Peter Foggo of Arup Associates, Laing secured the management contract for the construction of each phase in turn. Work on phase one, 1 Finsbury Avenue began in December 1982 and was completed by September 1984 followed by phase two, 3 Finsbury Avenue, from October 1985 to December 1986 with work beginning on phase three, 2 Finsbury Avenue in January 1987 and complete by April 1988. The design for each of the three buildings followed a "shell and core" approach incorporating flexibility in the internal construction and allowing simple reconfiguration of space according to tenants needs. Laing undertook several contracts to refit office space in each of the buildings in subsequent years

© Historic England Archive

Installing clerestory windows JLP01_08_062292

COMMONWEALTH INSTITUTE, KENSINGTON HIGH STREET, KENSINGTON AND CHELSEA, GREATER LONDON. A worker installing window frames in the clerestory between the central and outer roof sections of the exhibition hall at the Commonwealth Institute.
Laing built the Commonwealth Institute between October 1960 and October 1962 to replace the former Imperial Institute that was to be demolished to make way for new facilities at Imperial College. The building consisted of a four-storey administrative block housing a library, restaurant, board room and conference hall and a separate two-storey b lock containing a cinema with an art gallery above, but the focus of the project was the exhibition hall with its hyperbolic paraboloid roof, the first of its kind constructed in Great Britain. The exhibition, designed by James Gardner, provided spaces where each of the Commonwealth nations could showcase their achievements and characteristics, primarily to school children as teaching aids to enliven history and geography lessons.
The shell arch of the central roof section was of reinforced concrete, cast in situ using timber formwork with rough sawn boards to provide a textured internal surface whilst the four outer "warps" were constructed using precast beams and wood wool slabs, blocks of shredded timber bound together in a cement paste and left visible from the interior. The entire roof was then clad in copper sheeting over a layer of vermiculite. It covers an area of 33,700sqft, 183 feet square with the central section 93 feet square and ranges between 30ft high at its lowest and 80ft at the peaks

© Historic England Archive