Barbican Complex
Silk Street
London
EC2Y 8DS
Visitor Information
Other entrances on Wood Street, Beech Street and Aldersgate Street
Architect: Chamberlin Powell and Bon
Built: 1965 – 1976
Size: 160,000 m2 / 123 metres high
Awards: Grade II listed
Structural engineers: Ove Arup & Partners
By 1951, following extensive bomb damage, only 58 people lived in the Cripplegate ward of the City of London. To help bring life back to this demolished 40-acre site, the City Corporation’s Court of Common Council agreed to the building of a bold, new traffic-free residential mega-structure to house ‘City professionals’. Chamberlin Powell and Bon, who had designed the ground-breaking Golden Lane Estate next door (which also has integrated amenities), were chosen as architects.
The brutalist concrete estate, built using a grey Penlee bush-hammered granite facing, contains 2,018 flats. A paean to ‘utopian living’, it contains mixed towers and terrace blocks, many raised on columns to allow continuity and grouped around lakes and lawns with a maze of highwalks. The vertiginous crossing over the lake is a central feature. This ‘walled town’ was designed to provide both privacy and protection from noise. The Barbican boasts three of the capital’s tallest residential towers (Lauderdale, Shakespeare and Cromwell) which stand at 42 storeys (123 metres high) and contain sought-after penthouse flats. Their jagged balconies cutting through the skyline are an arresting sight. A prevailing motif of the development is a semi-circular shape, used on windows and white-painted canopies – a nod to Le Corbusier.
The genius of the Barbican’s design – and the reason it has become such a desirable place to live – is its sense of openness and skilful use of space (the total pedestrian area of the Barbican is nearly twice the actual size of the site) and its on-site amenities at the Barbican Arts Centre, the largest multi-arts venue in Europe. In 2006 the estate underwent a £14.1m accessibility refurbishment. The estate was Grade II listed in 2001. It is owned and managed by the City of London Corporation.