- Paternoster Square
Paternoster Square is an urban development, owned by the
Mitsubishi Estate Co. , next toSt Paul's Cathedral in theCity of London ,England . In 1942 the area, which takes its name fromPaternoster Row , centre of the Londonpublishing trade, was devastated by aerial bombardment inThe Blitz duringWorld War II . It is now the location of theLondon Stock Exchange which relocated there fromThreadneedle Street in 2004, and of investment banks such asGoldman Sachs ,Merrill Lynch andNomura Securities Co. .1960s
From 1961-1967 the block between St Paul's Churchyard and Newgate Street was redeveloped according to a scheme by
William Graham Holford . The new Paternoster Square soon became unpopular, its grim (in the eyes of many) presence immediately north of one of the capital's prime tourist attractions an embarrassment. Robert Finch, the Lord Mayor of London, wrote in "The Guardian " in 2004, "The old Paternoster Square was typical: ghastly, monolithic constructions without definition or character". [ [http://arts.guardian.co.uk/buildings/story/0,12879,1223138,00.html Ghastly] ]1980s and 1990s
In the late 1980s, as it became harder to fill leases on the site, there were proposals to redevelop the area. A competition was won in 1987 by
Arup associates with a complicated (some said incoherent) postmodern plan. This was abandoned in 1990 in favour of John Simpson's classicizing scheme, sponsored by a newspaper competition and championed by the Prince of Wales [ [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2003/11/05/bapat05.xml&sSheet=/arts/2003/11/05/ixartright.html Prince of Wales] ] . Dismissed by supporters of modern architectural styles aspastiche , this plan too was abandoned.In 1996 a masterplan by
William Whitfield was adopted and put into action over the following years. By October 2003 the redeveloped Paternoster square was complete, with buildings by Whitfield's firm and several others. Among the main tenants was the newly relocatedLondon Stock Exchange .Supporters of the scheme praised it for its harmonious architecture, much of it built in brick and stone like Wren's chapter house for St Paul's (which is integrated into the plan); for its mix of offices and shops; and for its coherent organization of space by means of a large central piazza and urban walkways which cut through the block in logical ways to tie it into the surrounding urban fabric; and claimed that it represented an ideal example of modern development on a traditional site.
Critics called the architecture banal; dismissed the
mixed-use credentials of any development which incorporated no housing (on weekends outside peak tourist season, they claimed, the pedestrian zone would be dead, its shops and restaurants empty); and denied that, consisting as it did mainly of a few large office blocks, it represented a new departure in urban planning.Monuments and sculpture
The main monument in the redeveloped square is the 23m tall "Paternoster Square Column" [ [http://www.cwo.uk.com/projects/paternoster_column.html Pasternoster Square Column] ] . It is a Corinthian column of
Portland stone topped by agold leaf covered flaming copper urn, which is illuminated byfibre-optic lighting at night. The column was designed by the architectsWhitfield Partners .At the north end of the square is the bronze " Shepherd and Sheep" by Dame Elisabeth Frink. The statue was commissioned for the previous Paternoster Square complex in 1975 and was replaced on a new plinth following the redevelopment.
Temple Bar was rebuilt there in 2004.
References
Gallery
External links
* [http://www.paternosterlondon.co.uk/ Paternoster Square] official website
* [http://www.cwo.uk.com/projects/paternoster_column.html CWO] construction of Paternoster Column
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