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Interview: Simon Cochrane Design Director Westfield


Westfield's vision was to create a new, dynamic and vibrant piece of East London by delivering Europe's largest retail-led regeneration project in time for the 2012 Olympics. It was the responsibility of


our design team to deliver this vision well before a shop had been leased or a major tenant approached. In the simplest terms we were invited to create a three dimensional site-wide master plan which successfully combined both urban design and commercial aspirations. We established the principle drivers for the planning of the site, creating key routes, a network of public open spaces and building blocks with a mixture of uses determined by their location. With two major transportation hubs at either end of a triangular site and major infrastructure constraints to the north and east, our masterplan sets up a simple diagram connecting these hubs with two distinctive pedestrian routes. Firstly, there is a new London high street, with a mix of uses contained within rational building blocks facilitating hotels and offices sitting comfortably above a ground plane activated by shops, bars and restaurants. A series of landscaped open spaces along the high street are designed to draw together this mixture of uses, with major entrances to the office and hotel buildings located adjacent to the cafes and bars, to provide for a vibrant and active public realm. Secondly, there is the curved galleria. At 400m in length and consisting of four levels of vibrant retail and leisure activity


it can already claim to be a global retail icon. Having established the master plan it was then possible to generate briefs for each of the building blocks, consisting of our commercial and urban design requirements. We collaborated with a number of the UK’s finest architectural talents to deliver a collection of buildings and a unifying public realm design which is unashamedly new and has in its spirit an optimism that reflects the projects role as a dynamic and vital legacy of the Olympic Games… the regeneration of a previously neglected piece of east London. Over the past five years we have had the benefit of both guidance and support from the projects appointed Design, Access and Environmental Review Panels. Their role and the success of the process established by the local authority and Westfield should not be underestimated. All three panels worked tirelessly with our design and engineering teams to ensure we met not only the stringent project benchmarks, but also the wider aspirations of a city watching while a new piece of London is born. The result is as much a credit to their diligence as it is to our endeavour. Finally, it is worth noting that Stratford City’s location in the heart of east London gave us a great opportunity to tap into its well-established and much celebrated creative community by integrating a number of smaller design commissions within the fabric of the project. Mixing commerce and culture in such a direct way has, we hope, made for a more diverse and engaging place which will continue to develop and evolve over the years to come.


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