Crown Place Screen
Crown Place, London
Buidling architects: Bennetts Associates, London
Engineers: WhitbyBird & Partners
2003 -

Just north of Broadgate, in the City of London, a new office building is being developed on a street block whose south-west corner is occupied by a Victorian pub and a chapel. A small public space with a park will be created in between, with a screen towards the street to mediate between the existing context, the park and the new buildings.

The grid of the city plan shifts at the corner of Sun Street and Wilson Street. The screen uses this shift, aligning with the roofline of the Flying Horse pub at its upper edge to provide continuity with the street line, and twisting to align with the grid of the new building at its bottom edge. The twist produces a complex play of light across the surface of the screen and provides an entrance to the park on a scale appropriate to the new building by widening the pavement at the opening.

The leaning edge of the screen and its single supporting column form a dynamic element within the streetscape and provide structural stability so that the elements remain as delicate as possible and the light effects are not overwhelmed.

Light is information about our surroundings. The presence of the new park is reflected onto the screen, and shimmering shifts in light and colour are captured on its surfaces. The viewer is made more aware of his or her own presence in this particular place and time.

We intend to capture these phenomena of light within the depth of the screen using a sweeping array of special reflective and coloured glass louvres suspended on a simple and delicate structure of vertical cables. The reflected image of trees and water will mingle with the reflected colour of the sky-lit upper surface of each louver as the viewer moves around the screen, to produce a constantly shifting play of light and moving image. The louvres are angled to allow maximum sun light into the park.

The screen is inseparable from the park. The "threshold" contains trees, other planting and the movement of water on a wall, which are then transformed through reflection onto the screen and re-presented to the street. The tree and water wall would be lit at night (rather than the screen itself), so that the movement of the water and leaves would provide the illumination of the screen. In this way the screen both represents the park and also becomes part of the spatial experience of entering it. Water from the water walls in channels separates the main park surface from the perimeter walls and the threshold, so that one must cross over moving water to enter the park. The surface of the park would be light stone to contain maximum levels of light in the park. From the park the screen would be seen as a constantly shifting display of colour as the upper surface of each louver is lit differently over the course of the day.

The screen is to be seen and appreciated over time, on an urban as well as an intimate scale, from inside as well as out, mediating between the existing context, the park and the new buildings. The screen and the park will form a harmonious and peaceful whole that connects the busy city dweller with light falling on moving water and leaves in the wind.