START CONTENTS INTRODUCTION TEAM PROCESS INSPIRATION LIVING A NEIGHBOURHOOD COMMUNITY AMENITIES THE PLACEMAKERS SALES ENQUIRIES CONTENTS INTRODUCTION TEAM PROCESS INSPIRATION LIVING A NEIGHBOURHOOD COMMUNITY AMENITIES THE PLACEMAKERS SALES ENQUIRIES Gehry Partners Prospect Place Prospect Place START CONTENTS INTRODUCTION TEAM PROCESS INSPIRATION LIVING A NEIGHBOURHOOD COMMUNITY AMENITIES THE PLACEMAKERS SALES ENQUIRIES WE DON’T DO ORDINARY START CONTENTS INTRODUCTION TEAM PROCESS INSPIRATION LIVING A NEIGHBOURHOOD COMMUNITY AMENITIES THE PLACEMAKERS SALES ENQUIRIES 03 Inspired by Art by Peter Murray Chairman of New London Architecture They say that That was until Frank Gehry came along. He didn’t add pieces of art architecture is to his buildings, he created whole ‘the mother of all buildings that were sculptures in themselves. the arts’; and for centuries buildings He first hit the headlines in the early Frank Gehry 70s making the ‘Easy Edges’ range incorporated art of cardboard furniture, cut from blocks with carvings, of laminated corrugated sheets into sinuous forms that give a hint of the sculpture and plastic architecture that was to come. decoration, forming Then in 1978, Gehry wrapped his rather ordinary suburban house in an integral part of Santa Monica with an aggressive the architecture. mix of metal sheets, plywood and chain link fencing. The neighbours Modern architects in the early part didn’t like it, but it drew Frank to the of the 20th century declared that attention of the world. In spite of its decoration was a sin and buildings punk exterior, the house retained a became minimal, with plain materials fairly conventional geometry; but and orthogonal shapes. that was about to change. Gehry Partners Prospect Place START CONTENTS INTRODUCTION TEAM PROCESS INSPIRATION LIVING A NEIGHBOURHOOD COMMUNITY AMENITIES THE PLACEMAKERS SALES ENQUIRIES 04 05 “ Even though I often put as much detail work into what I do as anyone, it always appears casual. That’s the edge I’m after. For people to see what I want them to see, but Frank had long been fascinated by as a file. This radical use of new a tonne each and each one different. for them not be quite fish and designed a series of lamps technology gave Gehry the power Without Gehry’s 3D technology using shattered pieces of formica to to create complex three dimensional it would have been impossible to sure if it was designed create the scales; then he realised that forms economically and without build. New Yorker magazine called or if it just happened.” their fluid forms could be adopted the delays and cost that usually it “The first big New York apartment for building. “My colleagues were accompany such unorthodox house that is worth talking about in FRANK GEHRY starting to replay Greek temples,” architecture. These modelling tools more than a generation” and praised he said with reference to the trend were key to the construction of the interior layout, “You can live in towards Post Modernism. “Why are Guggenheim Bilbao, which became rooms that are neither dull boxes nor you stopping at the Greeks? If you an overnight sensation when it weird shapes that leave no place for wanna go back, dammit, go back opened in 1997, not just for its your furniture.” In 2010 Vanity Fair three hundred million years. So I radical architecture but for the declared Frank Gehry “The most started drawing fish in my sketchbook economic and regenerative impact it important architect of our age.” and then I started to realise that there had on the city. The architect Philip was something in it.” In 1986 he built Johnson described the Guggenheim More recently, Gehry Partners has a giant fish from copper mesh, using as “the greatest building of our time.” been working on buildings for the conventional construction methods, The Walt Disney Concert Hall, Los Foundation Louis Vuitton and the for the Fishdance Restaurant in Kobe, Angeles, completed six years later, Guggenheim Abu Dhabi. His new 01 Japan. It was more a billboard than a cemented Gehry’s role as one of the campus for Facebook at Menlo Park, building, but it was a beginning. great architects of his time. which includes a building with a single room to hold 3,000 people, Double curves are very difficult and His designs for 8 Spruce Street, a the largest single office space in the expensive to design and build; so in 76-storey luxury residential tower world, is due to open in 2015. 1992, Gehry’s office developed the in Lower Manhattan, have been use of computer-aided design and universally praised by critics and the Coincidentally, in Silicon Valley 01 Frank Gehry jumping on a desk from his public alike. The sculpted facade too, Gehry will be facing up ‘Easy Edges’ series of cardboard furniture manufacturing for a fish building 02 Frank Gehry working in his office in for the Barcelona Olympics. The sparkles in the sunlight, with billowing to Foster + Partners, who are Los Angeles sculptural form was modelled by the folds based on the sculptures of designing 1 Infinite Loop, the computer in three dimensions and Bernini, constructed from 10,300 world headquarters of Apple, delivered directly to the fabricators stainless-steel panels, weighing half just down the road. 02 Gehry Partners Prospect Place START CONTENTS INTRODUCTION TEAM PROCESS INSPIRATION LIVING A NEIGHBOURHOOD COMMUNITY AMENITIES THE PLACEMAKERS SALES ENQUIRIES 07 01 01 Walt Disney Concert Hall, Los Angeles 2003 02 8 Spruce Street, New York 2011 02 Gehry Partners Prospect Place START CONTENTS INTRODUCTION TEAM PROCESS INSPIRATION LIVING A NEIGHBOURHOOD COMMUNITY AMENITIES THE PLACEMAKERS SALES ENQUIRIES 09 01 Hotel Marques De Riscal, Elciego 2006 02 DZ Bank Building, Berlin 2001 03 Guggenheim Museum, Bilbao 1997 01 02 03 Gehry Partners Prospect Place START CONTENTS INTRODUCTION TEAM PROCESS INSPIRATION LIVING A NEIGHBOURHOOD COMMUNITY AMENITIES THE PLACEMAKERS SALES ENQUIRIES 10 11 Team Could you introduce Gesa Buettner (GB) I have worked with Frank for nine yourselves and years in different positions and I am explain your roles currently the Project Architect on the Battersea Power Station project, on the project? leading the team developing the facade and the interiors. Craig Webb (CW) I’m a Design Partner with Gehry Tae Park (TP) Partners and I have worked with I am a Project Designer working Frank for 25 years. I mainly do design on the Battersea Power Station work, but then design work covers a project. I’ve been involved with the lot of ground here, so it also covers project since the competition phase. a lot of the functionality of buildings I’ve worked with Frank for almost 10 and it involves knowing about what years. The experience has been an buildings cost and how buildings get interesting journey. I started off just built. Currently there are 18 people like any other entry architect, working working on the project and the team in the model shop. I made hundreds has different expertise, so we all and hundreds of different massing work together to make the building models and sketches and slowly I what it is. started working on the more technical side of the facades. The Gehry Partners’ office in Los Angeles Gehry Partners Prospect Place START CONTENTS INTRODUCTION TEAM PROCESS INSPIRATION LIVING A NEIGHBOURHOOD COMMUNITY AMENITIES THE PLACEMAKERS SALES ENQUIRIES 12 What’s it like working for Frank Gehry? Over the 25 years that I’ve worked with Frank, we’ve built many, many buildings – at least 25. We’ve designed furniture; we’ve even done two opera sets and are in the process of doing a third. We love music and we love to do buildings about music. I’d been an architect for 13 years before I started working for him, so I had a lot of commercial experience. Working with Frank and understanding how he thinks is not something that can be explained; it’s not something you can be taught. He’s a tough critic and he’s the toughest on himself first and then everybody around him. 02 The learning process has been tough, but I’ve learned a huge amount. It’s been exciting and we’ve done 01 The Gehry Suite at Hotel Marques de Riscal in Spain 02 Knoll Cross Check™ Chair 1990 some great buildings. It’s been a 03 Frank Gehry designing his furniture range for Knoll wild ride! CW 01 03 Gehry Partners Prospect Place START CONTENTS INTRODUCTION TEAM PROCESS INSPIRATION LIVING A NEIGHBOURHOOD COMMUNITY AMENITIES THE PLACEMAKERS SALES ENQUIRIES 15 Why did you enter the Phase 3 competition at Battersea Power Station? I think the most interesting part of this project for us was that we had never done a building in London before. We had looked at projects in London quite a bit, but have never been able to hook up in the right way. This seemed like the right opportunity to enter the competition to design Phase 3. We really like to do residential buildings because it’s about a relationship – it’s about creating a situation in which people live. That is interesting to us. CW I agree, it’s been a big deal to do the project in London. We’ve been waiting for that, so it’s fantastic to be part of it, also because London is a very, very interesting city. It has a certain edginess that we also have in LA, although people often compare LA with Berlin and New York with London, but I think there are a lot of things that you find between LA and London that you can learn from. GB CGI of an aerial view looking east over London Gehry Partners Prospect Place START CONTENTS INTRODUCTION TEAM PROCESS INSPIRATION LIVING A NEIGHBOURHOOD COMMUNITY AMENITIES THE PLACEMAKERS SALES ENQUIRIES 16 17 One of the most exciting things for me on the first trip to London was to actually visit The Power Station and get the chance to go up the chimneys and see the control room.