what is london's worst building?

according to a time out poll, these are london's ten worst buildings:

http://www.thisislondon.com/londoncuts/articles/17410998?source=Evening Standard

which one d'you think's worst?

Can anyone suggest a viable, architectural reason as to why Buckingham Palace is so bad?

I think the vote (in Time Out) has been swayed by the republican feeling. It's a shame because there could have been a real vote that would ensure certain eyesores are finally torn down.

Not keen on Heffalump & Castle but Key Bridge House in Vauxhall offends me each time I walk past it.

What. The. Fuck. Is. That!

tearing down buckingham palace would be a good start...

preferably with the windsor klan inside.

It's just too drab and not impressive enough given its location - it just brings the entire area down - looking down the Mall towards that monstrosity is very disheartening - imagine how good a truly magnificent builiding would look in that prime spot.

although I don't think that picture really does it's ming-ness justice.

judging solely on my particular bugbear, pedestrian-friendly-ness, it has to be the barbican.

The Brunswick centre, definitely. It's ugly and depressing and completely out of character for the area. Although one good thing is that its so minging no chain shops want to move in there.

St Helier Hospital

I quite like the Brunswick Centre. Used to spend hours hassling shoppers outside Safeway to buy Socialist Worker. I think the reason people hate it is because it's a council estate.

I think E&C shopping centre is far worse.

Ah. Or rather, eurgh!

In London?

I had to google to find out what No 1 Poultry is...



Hmmmmm

i think centrepoint is pretty fucking vile. i don't mind buck house architecturally, its what it represents that offends me. personally i'd have it turned into retirement flats.

what london needs is more gothic towerblocks.

It's certainly not one of the ugliest. The front from the Mall is phenomenally bland, but quite cleverly disguises the fact that it is a refacing of a really ugly block that was thrown up in the 1840s to house Queen Victoria's ever expanding brood. The rest of the building (designed by Nash) is worth keeping as a People's Museum come the revolution.

The Portland Stone front is actually one of the earliest examples of pre-fabricated construction - put up one summer while George V was off shooting!

No, in Cairo.

No. 1 Poultry

By the time he designed this, IMO Jim Stirling was clearly losing it. There is no subtlety at all, and the facades look like a kid's set of building blocks.

Don't forget they demolished Mappin and Webb building to construct it - one of the best Victorian examples of "how to turn a corner with style".

The only decent feature is the views from the roof garden, although I think typical City security may now restrict access to customers of the pricy Conran restaurant.

For another view... see here

Im not sure what some of those building look like, but I'v been past No1 Poultry many times not knowing what it is but thinking it looks like it was made out of childrens building blocks. What was going on in the mind of that architect?!?
Not sure if it beats elephant and castles shopping centre though.

Not Jersey then?

Just looked at some pics of the original building. Oh my god, someone needs to be shot for what happened there.

Was going to nominate the British library in St Pancras but I'm now swaying towards no.1 Poultry. I go past it 3 days a week but until seeing that photo on this thread I didn't realise what a minger it is.

I actually like Centrepoint - am I the only one?
Makes an excellent homing beacon for those north of the river, by all accounts.

I like it too. Very distinctive.

I hate Portcullis House - an opportunity wasted. It's just so mediocre, such a cop-out of a building.

Buck Palace is pretty shite - I don't think that's to do with 'republican feeling' so much as it's a dull, oversized lump.

and at absolutely scandalous expense..


which reminds me, I guess the millennium tent isn't really a building..


incidently, just got back from Paris, we were staying in a hotel next to the Opera Garnier, walked past the renovated Louvre, it reminds you how feeble our public buildings are.. (we managed to avoid the new bibtech f. mitterand and lets not mention the Opera at La Bastille)

if you want superb modern buildings go to Berlin

Tower Bridge - Tower of London - Buckingham Palace (okay, just me it seems) - Vauxhall Cross (ditto) - National Gallery - Tate Modern - London Eye - Houses of Parliament - Swiss Re Gherkin - Nelson's Column - Marble Arch - City Hall - St. Paul's Cathedral - BBC Broadcasting House (NOT Television Centre!) - Victoria & Albert Museum - Natural History Museum...

Come on, the Olympics should be in our pocket on the basis of London's architectural wonders alone.

And I for one liked the idea of the Millennium Dome if only politicians hadn't hijacked the whole thing to be a corporate publicity stunt - amazing, something good done by Heseltine, but unsuprisingly ruined by New Labour!

What's Vauxhall Cross? Is that the Raelian escape ramp thingy that's the new bus interchange?

Elephant and Castle is godawful. So disjointed with all those big roads and that grim shopping centre.

I have voted for Centre Point just because I have seen it so often when I was going to gigs and I hate it.

And as for Buckingham Palace, poltics aside, it really is just a bland ungly building. A really lame attepmt and neo-classical(?) style. There are much better examples than that shit thing.



I mean look at this pic. Where is the excitment in it?