Walk from Southwark station to London Bridge - weaving through once-forgotten back streets to bustling pedestrian thoroughfares - to explore and understand Bankside's regeneration, including such game-changing projects as the Millennium Bridge, Tate Modern and the Shard.
Sitting just south of the river, Bankside has found its new identity in large-scale public and private projects dating from the Millennium. Transport for London has saved Jubilee Line Southwark station with a new design by MJP Architects, featuring a light-filled rotunda. Opposite Will Alsop’s cantilevered Palestra building leads the walk into the Low Line – a maze of brick-lined railway viaducts overhead and alleys below connecting new hubs of creativity, entertainment and industry.
Music Box, a 14-storey luxury residential/educational pavilion by Spaarc Architecture, sits side by side with the railway, while hillside-like residential terraces of Bear Lane by Panter Hudspith complement the surrounding 19th-century warehouses and light industrial buildings.
Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners Neo Bankside is a residential pavilion pointing the way to Tate Modern by Herzog de Meuron via its Blavatnik Building extension. The three-part Bankside Mix on Southwark Street sits opposite the architect Allies and Morrison’s own offices and indicates the practice’s prominent master-planner role in Bankside’s revival.
To the east, Renzo Piano’s 'The Shard' looms over Union Street’s residual Dickensian character, while new office infills by AHMM and Alan Camp Architects below busy railway tracks exploit every last meter. Borough Market’s new Viaduct, designed by Jestico Whiles, and Ted Cullinan’s revival of a medieval palace ruin refresh Bankside’s 21st-century coming of age.
This walk is led by an experienced Blue Badge Guide.
Meeting point: Southwark Station at street level, Blackfriars Rd, London SE1 8JZ
End: London Bridge Station
Duration: 2 hours approx.
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