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Building
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Opened: 2014
Address: City of London, London EC3A, UK 0.1 ft N , 51.5138°N 0.0821°W
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| Leadenhall Building |
Website: www.theleadenhallbuilding.com
Leadenhall Building:
122 Leadenhall Street is an address on Leadenhall Street in London where the 225 m (737 ft)-tall
Leadenhall Building is currently under construction. The skyscraper, due for completion in mid-2014, is designed by Richard Rogers and informally known as the Cheesegrater because of its distinctive wedge shape. It is one of a number of new tall buildings for the City of London financial district, with others including 20 Fenchurch Street (known as the Walkie-Talkie), the Pinnacle, and an as yet unnamed project at 52-54 Lime Street.
The site is adjacent to the Lloyd's building, also designed by Rogers, which is the current home of the insurance market Lloyd's of London. Until 2007 the Leadenhall site was occupied by a building owned by the developer British Land and designed by Gollins Melvin Ward Partnership that was constructed in the 1960s. That building was demolished in preparation for redevelopment of the site. By December 2009, the site was cleared but construction had stalled. The project, initially delayed due to the financial crisis, was revived in October 2010, and Oxford Properties is now co-developing the property in partnership with British Land.
In May 2013, the co-developers announced that the building is over 51% pre-let, with tenancy agreements reached with insurance broker Aon and insurance group Amlin.
History of Leadenhall Building:
Prior to the site's previous redevelopment in the 1960s, it had been used as the head office of the Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company (P&O) for over a century. Since 1840, P&O had worked in the rent-free offices of Willcox & Anderson. However, business east of the Gulf of Suez increased in the late-1840s resulting in the company needing newer and larger offices. It was the P&O directors' obligation to provide new space. In November 1845, the King's Arms inn and hotel at 122 Leadenhall Street was put up for sale. The freehold was bought by P&O for £7,250, which then commissioned an architect, Beachcroft, to design a new building. The cost of the new building was estimated at £8,000. In March 1848, P&O moved into the new office.
In 1854, P&O unsuccessfully attempted to purchase the neighbouring building at 121 Leadenhall Street, however they were eventually able to take a lease from the charity which held it. They also bought leases of 80 years from St. Thomas's Hospital on the residential properties at Nos. 123, 124 and 125 Leadenhall Street which were demolished to create a new frontage at No. 122. The new building provided more office space, some of which was for rent, and a spacious new courtyard.
By the mid-1960s P&O needed to redevelop the site to provide increased office space again. At the same time, the Commercial Union Assurance Company was also planning a redevelopment on an adjacent site on the corner of St. Mary Axe. However, due to a number of issues affecting both sites, notably poor access to the Commercial Union site and the restricted width of the P&O site, it was not possible to obtain planning consents that would optimise the amount of floor space desired by either company. As a result, the two companies decided to participate in a joint development that would involve the reallocation of site boundaries and the creation of an open concourse area at the junction of Leadenhall Street and St. Mary Axe. Both companies would have frontages to the new concourse and would retain site areas equivalent to those enclosed by the original boundaries........Wikipedia >>
