YOU don’t have to be a fan of Pink Floyd or inflatable livestock to admire Battersea Power Station’s ‘toppled table’ silhouette. (For the uninitiated, a blow-up pig was tethered to it for the 1977 Animals album cover—it escaped and caused havoc with the Heathrow flight path before landing in Kent.) For decades, this dramatically decaying ‘temple of power’ has been surrounded by a vast, fenced-off wasteland, but a £9 billion regeneration has changed its fate; once complete, this buzzing area will provide 4,239 homes.
Built-in two halves from 1929 and designed by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott of red telephone box and Tate Modern fame, its boiler house (the central part) is so enormous you could fit St Paul’s Cathedral inside. At one time, it produced one-fifth of the capital’s power, responsible for electrifying the BBC Television Centre, Houses of Parliament, Buckingham Palace, Carnaby Street and Wimbledon.
We were lucky that, during the Blitz, the Luftwaffe (like our RAF pilots), found the plumes of white vapour from its two 331fttall chimneys too useful as a navigational tool to risk bombing it. Then, in 1955, the icon as we know it was born with the completion of the second half of the ‘table’. However, electrical output waned and both stations ‘A’ and ‘B’ were shut by 1983; thus began decades of conjecture over the Grade II*-listed building’s future.
Denne historien er fra February 23, 2022-utgaven av Country Life UK.
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Denne historien er fra February 23, 2022-utgaven av Country Life UK.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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Happiness in small things
Putting life into perspective and forces of nature in farming
Colour vision
In an eye-baffling arrangement of geometric shapes, a sinister-looking clown and a little girl, Test Card F is one of television’s most enduring images, says Rob Crossan
'Without fever there is no creation'
Three of the top 10 operas performed worldwide are by the emotionally volatile Italian composer Giacomo Puccini, who died a century ago. Henrietta Bredin explains how his colourful life influenced his melodramatic plot lines
The colour revolution
Toxic, dull or fast-fading pigments had long made it tricky for artists to paint verdant scenes, but the 19th century ushered in a viridescent explosion of waterlili
Bullace for you
The distinction between plums, damsons and bullaces is sweetly subtle, boiling down to flavour and aesthetics, but don’t eat the stones, warns John Wright
Lights, camera, action!
Three remarkable country houses, two of which have links to the film industry, the other the setting for a top-class croquet tournament, are anything but ordinary
I was on fire for you, where did you go?
In Iceland, a land with no monks or monkeys, our correspondent attempts to master the art of fishing light’ for Salmo salar, by stroking the creases and dimples of the Midfjardara river like the features of a loved one
Bravery bevond belief
A teenager on his gap year who saved a boy and his father from being savaged by a crocodile is one of a host of heroic acts celebrated in a book to mark the 250th anniversary of the Royal Humane Society, says its author Rupert Uloth
Let's get to the bottom of this
Discovering a well on your property can be viewed as a blessing or a curse, but all's well that ends well, says Deborah Nicholls-Lee, as she examines the benefits of a personal water supply
Sing on, sweet bird
An essential component of our emotional relationship with the landscape, the mellifluous song of a thrush shapes the very foundation of human happiness, notes Mark Cocker, as he takes a closer look at this diverse family of birds
