We must stop making London so ugly with all these hideous high-rises
Evening Standard|May 14, 2024
ACTON, where I live, can stake no claim to being the most beautiful part of London, though over the 12 years I’ve lived here I’ve grown incredibly fond of its quirks and idiosyncrasies.
Anna van Praagh
We must stop making London so ugly with all these hideous high-rises

Architecturally, it’s pretty mixed between predominantly Victorian and Edwardian housing, the odd Georgian gem, a mix of social housing and more recently some of the tallest high-rises in London.

Highly improbably, North Acton has become a kind of mini-Manhattan, where not a day goes by it seems without more random towers popping up like post-apocalyptic triffids. One particular outrageously skyline-wrecking eyesore, at 184 metres, is the tallest residential tower in London outside the Canary Wharf cluster. When I say you can see it from 100 miles away I don’t mean that as a compliment.

So I was interested to read a recent report from New London Architecture which identified 583 tall buildings of more than 20 stories high “queuing up in the pipeline” for London.

The report, London’s Growing Up: A Decade of Building Tall, says the rapid change to the capital’s once predominantly low-rise skyline “has been fuelled by burgeoning demand for office and residential space, overseas investment and a supportive planning environment”. Which I guess just means officials cheerfully signing off any hideous carbuncle put on their desks.

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