Masterplan Shoreditch - A Triangle of Placemaking
Architect and Project Manager – Douglas and King Architects
Quantity Surveyor – Andrew Morton Associates
Clients Agent – John D Wood
Planning Consultant – BNP Paribas
Structural Engineer – Conisbee
MandE Engineers – Flatt
Agent – Sterling Ackroyd
Douglas and King undertook the development of a Master Plan and Urban Design Framework for a triangular island site in Shoreditch, bordered by Great Eastern Street (north), Singer Street (west), and Tabernacle Street (south-east).
The proposal re-introduced an historic street, creating a new public piazza, re-imagining two 19th century terraces, designing three iconic new buildings which are responsive to their neighbours, and restoring a sense of place to a semi-derelict urban block within the South Shoreditch Conservation Area.
The masterplan drew upon the diversity, optimism, history, culture, and industrial heritage of this part of East London alongside the contemporary influences that now make Shoreditch one of the most successful urban regeneration programmes in Europe.
Shoreditch is an urban paradox that is both free-form and densely continuous: it is now hosts one of London’s most creative hubs. It is colourful, optimistic, characterful and its indigenous communities are a strong and vibrant part of this paradox. Those communities have lived through a period of decline, neglect, traffic driven interventions and those challenges have left a deep-rooted sense of self determination amidst much uncertainty.
Our goals were to enhance the historic fabric of Shoreditch, to express through architecture and conservation the area’s rich history, to mirror the multiplicity of its inhabitants and to protect this Triangle from the commercial hub that is centred round the Old Street Roundabout.
Whilst this project was very sucessful and all the aspirations of the clients brief were fully met, changing market conditions have led to a new design team being appointed to take the project forward with a new brief.
The design team and delivery of this project was led by Douglas and King Architects. For information on our processes read our blog on creative leadershio by CLICKING HERE
Place-making The Triangle
The Triangle Master Plan will re-introduce an historic street, offer new vistas and a new public recreational space. It will restore a terrace of historic townhouses and provide 70,000 square feet of new workspace, retail, and commercial accommodation. It will be characteristic of the local street boundaries and urban pattern and it will not be a private commercial development. In keeping with the success of Shoreditch’s regeneration progamme achieved so far, the aspirations of Reitman Yard hinge on the inspiration of the entrepreneurial community that will work, visit, and grow within it’s environment.
How we are doing it
The primary ordering strategy is the shape of the site and the interface it forms between Tabernacle Square/Great Eastern Street, Singer Street and Old Street. The secondary ordering strategy is the conservation and restoration of the existing historic terraces that form two sides of the Triangle. The third is the demolition of derelict plots and the re-creation of lost legacies. The fourth is a considered workplace strategy, and the fifth is the dialogue that the new architecture will have within the Triangle, with its immediate neighbours, and towards the urban character of the adjacent streets.
An open thoroughfare leading to and through a piazza will be at the heart of the development and is central to the intention that Reitman Yard lies wholly within the public realm. This will also act as a foyer to the inner facades of the buildings and a restful traffic-free backwater to the busy pedestrian and traffic routes in the immediate area. Contemporary landscaping will re-imagine St Agnes Well, and contribute moments of intensity and tranquillity. A social space will be defined through the connectivity of cultivation, streetscape and atmosphere
The Physical Assets
The Triangle Master Plan will create a new 10-storey Picture House to the west of the site that acts as an ‘expressive marker’ along the route from Islington to Hackney. The Picture House is the tallest element of the development and our intention is to reflect the typologies of the proposed multi-storey Art ‘Otel, (occupying a focal position opposite Tabernacle Square) and Shoreditch House (a residential tower), on the junction of Great Eastern Street and Pitfield Street.
The existing Titchfield House will be demolished and replaced with a new contemporary building of five storeys that, height-wise, aligns itself with the existing roof levels. It will converse in it’s 21st century style with the architectural character of the 19th century industrial buildings along Singer Street and Tabernacle Street.
95 Tabernacle Street is currently a void in the urban fabric of the site and is the most visible aspect of the development as its corner position is a key local node on a principal point of intersection. An iconic galleried building informs the extension and re-imagining of the two adjacent terraces of townhouses. These are to be re-designed to create front to back shops, an architectural intervention that will provide glimpses through to the life of Reitman Yard.
What it will be like
The Triangle Master Plan confidently and consistently reflects the strategy of LB Hackney for the South Shoreditch Conservation area. Each component or building can be designed individually in response to its immediate and neighbouring context.
The proposals for Picture House, Titchfield House and 95 Tabernacle Street are explained in more detail elsewhere on this website.
