A place that collapses time: the thrilling reimagination of Battersea Power Station
telegraph.co.ukBattersea Power Station. It was the mid-1990s, and the once-venerable power station was at a low ebb, its roof removed, the whole edifice trapped in a kind of purgatory where new developers would bring fresh hope, only for each plan to fizzle out in a mess of recriminations and bankruptcy.We used to squeeze through a fence at dawn and sit, jangling, our ears throbbing, in the shadows of the four off-white towers, feeling that pleasurable sense of sublimity you get next to vast buildings.
The sun would come up over the dirty river and it felt as if we were in some blasted and unpeopled London, a dark vision of the future.In the febrile political climate of post-Great War Britain, the proposed construction of Battersea Power Station drew furious protests, with Londoners fearing that it would blight both the air and the skyline.
It was nevertheless begun in 1929, initially with two towers, and designed by Giles Gilbert Scott, famous for both the red telephone box and Liverpool Cathedral.
To that building - Battersea A Power Station - was added another, Battersea B, begun in 1937, but completed only in 1955.The two stations had distinct identities, with the first full of art deco flourishes: ornate parquet flooring and Grecian fretwork ornamentation.
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