Only chain stores of a certain size need apply

The one thing the team behind the redevelopment of Battersea Power Station have been very keen to stress – whether it ultimately turns out to be the case or not – is that they are not intending it to be just another luxury flat development. Yes, a studio flat may set you back £800,000 but, really, it’s a mixed development, they tell everyone they can find.

Following this theme then, they have just unveiled the first commercial tenants for the site and they are trying to reassure everyone it will not be just another identikit high street, at least not just yet anyway. Rob Tincknell, the chief executive of the Battersea Power Station Development Company, says he has been ‘approached by a number of big chains’ about leasing sections of the development but that they haveall been refused.

Instead, there will be Pedler – a sister branch to a restaurant in Peckham – the fourth Vagabond wine shop, a General Store (any relation to the hilariously hip and expensive General Store in Bellenden Road, Peckham?) and a new incarnation of Allens the Butchers, the lovely shop which once graced Mount Street in Mayfair for so many years before being forced to close by spiralling rents. (If you ever watched an episode of Poirot with David Suchet or Jeeves & Wooster with Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie, and a scene required a butchers, it would be Allens that would feature.)

There will also be a fourth outlet of The CoffeeWorks Project and a fifth pub from the smart pub/restaurant chain Darwin & Wallace (for an idea of the sort of thing they might offer just look here). And there will be a Village Hall space run in partnership with the Battersea Arts Centre.

These all sound very good – I’m particularly pleased to learn Allens will have a high street presence once more though it will never match the sheer romance and beauty of its previous site where the butcher's block was curved by years of use and the window was full of hanging pig carcasses – but clearly chains aren’t banned. They just have to be chains of a certain size. It rather seems to me this trend was set by the refurbished St Pancras Station which, when it first opened to acclaim, eschewed major high street stores and set a model many now follow. It isn’t fairing badly at St Pancras, though, some may feel regrettably, there are two WHSmiths and two M&S stores there now.

Whereas for many years, people feared shopping area developments would tragically lead to a disappointing interpretation of Slough High Street, with every functional chainstore turning up for duty, now it seems developers are trying to ape more apparently edgy areas. It is more likely to be the hip streets of Shoreditch, Peckham and Brixton providing the inspiration these days. So, while we wait to see whether Battersea Power Station becomes yet another lonely enclave where the wealthy have placed their money to gather decent interest or a mixed residential community, the Battersea Power Station Company does deserve credit for trying to be thoughtful and imaginative in the commercial spaces at the site. They may still be small chains in glass-fronted stores but we're not bored of them yet. 

The Gehry has landed

The Battersea Power Station redevelopment is gathering pace. Just days after the prices of the phase two properties were announced, architectural details of phase three have swiftly emerged.

As visions from the offices of Frank Gehry and Norman Foster were unveiled, Rob Tincknell, the head of the redevelopment company, said he wants to make ‘Battersea a showcase for the world’s very best architects’. A very laudable aim, though some may argue Battersea Power Station already is a showcase of one of the world’s great architects; Sir Giles Gilbert Scott.

Sir Giles Gilbert Scott's 'vision'

Inevitably, the new buildings have been greeted with great enthusiasm by many; words and phrases like ‘exciting’, ‘vibrant’ and ‘landmark’ have been bandied about: these new buildings will create ‘a genuine sense of place’ with ‘its own identity and integrity’.

Ed Vaizey, the culture minister, said the new designs ‘will ensure the development of this former industrial site will put Battersea on the world stage once again’. And he is evidently delighted that London ‘continues to attract the best in terms of architecture, design and innovation’. 

The third phase will feature 1,300 homes - just 103 of which are designated 'affordable' - a 160 room hotel and 350,000 square of retail and restaurant space. And running through it will be a new high street – called The Electric Boulevard.

It is inevitable, of course, that projects of this magnitude attract the most celebrated architects of the day; as I have written previously, the star names of Zaha Hadid, David Chipperfield and Grimshaw are amongst the firms submitting their visions for a proposed, new £500million Crystal Palace. And it is also inevitable that these firms produce extravagant, sometimes shocking, proposals for such sites, eager to display their own audacity and talents, regardless of whether they are appropriate in such contexts.

According to Battersea's press release, Gehry’s and Foster’s designs ’will complement the iconic power station, but from the visualisations released they rather threaten to overwhelm Gilbert Scott’s masterpiece. Of the two, Fosters contribution is less confrontational though their bulk is considerable. Gehry’s towers, however, are large and seem contextually alien.

Gehry claims to connect ’into the historic fabric of the city of London’ - we’ll overlook the minor detail that the site is not actually in the historic City of London - but I struggle to see such a connection. For such a monumental building, the combination of the two designs threatens leaving the power station looking oddly out of place in its own home.

Who would live in a house like this?

A view of a planned garden

The banks of the Thames look likely soon to emerge as only occasionally broken terraces of luxury flats, complementing an array of developments across the capital aimed, almost exclusively, at the ultra-rich. Invariably, flats are sold off plan to foreign owners before anyone in London gets a chance for a view – if you can bear it, below is a video from a sales package for a block in East London aimed at prospective buyers in Hong Kong:

But the development in Battersea Power Station is supposed to be different. Back in February, the developers - Battersea Power Station Development Company - announced 254 apartments, from studios to £30million penthouses, would be marketed in the UK only.

At the time the chief executive of the company, Rob Tincknell, said:

'There has been a lot of comment recently about London's housing problems, and we believe the only way to try and solve this is to build great homes and create a community that people actually want to live in.'

Well, today the company offers a glimpse into these new homes, which go on sale on May 1, and while they are being marketed in the UK, Battersea looks set to be a pretty exclusive community.

Studio flats will start from £800,000, one bed apartments from £1m with two-bed apartments starting at £1.5m. For anyone wanting anything more substantial - families for example - for a three-bed house you would have to start with £2.7m spare and a four bedroom house will cost upwards of £4m. For the luxury apartments, the price is, well, if you have to ask you can't afford it.

The overall Rafael Vinoly masterplan apparently includes more than 500 affordable housing units, evidently these are not them. In fact they are not due until phase 5; this is phase 2.

There is little doubt that once completed these will be pretty special places to live and the developers boast they will be significantly larger than other comparable projects. Many will have spectacular views overlooking the Thames 'or back on to the famous Boiler House facade'. And all will have access to the rooftop, 1.5acre, garden.

A living room

To reach the entrance lobbies of two blocks away from Giles Gilbert Scott's building - Switch House East and West - residents will have to cross 'a static water pool that encircles the entire Power Station', a feature formerly known as a moat.

The developers dream of creating a 'vibrant community' apparently and at least they are going to efforts to attract UK buyers, but it looks destined to being just one of many luxury developments dotted across London, albeit distinguished by a 1930s architectural marvel. After all, who buys a studio flat for £800,000? Most likely by someone who doesn't intend on living there. Hardly a recipe for a vibrant community.

Let's hope I'll be proved wrong.