Elephant & Castle Project
Elephant & Castle ProjectKnightsbridge ApartmentLittle Chester StreetGarden StudioSuffolk FarmsteadCarriage HouseNorth VatBrick HouseChelsea Art StudioKensington ApartmentWhite Eagle HousePocket LivingPiccadilly HotelBelgravia TownhouseKensington TownhouseHans Town ApartmentSartor HousePimlico TownhouseWandsworth HouseSouthwark HouseFormer EmbassyCorner CottageNotting Hill TownhouseArtist’s ResidenceReading ProjectBryggen HytteAmbassadors HotelDorchester ParadeBrandsby HallHighland Retreat
Once understood as the effervescent ‘Piccadilly of South London’, Elephant & Castle has long been a centre for landmark architecture. When invited to work on a mixed-use development on one of its principal thoroughfares, we seized the opportunity to pick up this tradition where it left off. Our brief was to maximise value by increasing the density and enhancing the optics of a prominent corner site, subject to especial scrutiny from planning officers.
From the offset, Southwark Council made it clear that planning would only be granted if the proposed scheme was of an exceptional design quality. The composition needed to make an interesting and visually striking contribution to Elephant and Castle without disturbing protected perspectives of the street. This was an extremely difficult design resolution, but we nevertheless received consent to build a destination restaurant with seven apartments above.
Our response was to design a mixed-use bronze-clad building that increased in height from three to five storeys as it turned the corner. Picking up on the colour palette and rooflines of the surrounding nineteenth-century buildings, whilst using unfamiliar materials, we produced something at once sympathetic and uncompromisingly new.
