Major redevelopment of a 1960s icon, featuring retail facades with large-format frameless glazing and a new residential block clad in precast concrete.

Civic Trust Award 2019

Centre Point, an icon of 1960s London, has undergone extensive refurbishment and conversion into a residential development, with a ground level podium of retail and leisure. A large public plaza replaces a busy traffic thoroughfare.

Eckersley O’Callaghan has acted as facade engineer on the retained and new-build elements for three of the project’s main structures; Centre Point Link; Centre Point House; and White Lion House. All blocks have had 5m tall frameless structural glass retail facades inserted at ground level. The most prominent area of ground floor glazing is the retail unit beneath Centre Point Link, the link bridge between listed structures. The retail space required maximum transparency and minimum structure, which presented several challenges. Large structural movements from the existing 1960s structure had to be accommodated by the glass within minimal head and base restraint details. The existing Grade II listed facades have been thermally upgraded and restored to new working order. 

White Lion House is a new nine-storey residential block clad in embossed precast panels with punched windows and balconies. A quilted facade treatment on the east and west elevations features a chevron pattern echoing the forms of the Centre Point tower. The pattern development involved extensive prototyping.

All the facades have onerous acoustic requirements, and the numerous interfaces between new and existing structures have required careful consideration for weather-tightness and thermal performance.

Location
London, UK

Client
Almacantar

Architect
Rick Mather Architects | MICA