United States Embassy – London
The Department of State built a new facility that sets a new paradigm in embassy design, termed Design Excellence, which emphasized the role of architecture in diplomacy.
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Project Details
Thornton Tomasetti provided structural engineering and protective design for the new United States Embassy in London. The Department of State built a new facility that sets a new paradigm in embassy design, termed Design Excellence, which emphasized the role of architecture in diplomacy.
Traditional Aesthetics Paired with Security
The embassy is located in Wandsworth, south of the Thames River, between Battersea Park and Vauxhall, within an emerging commercial and residential area of London’s Central Activity Zone. The facility meets all the required security standards while honoring the English tradition of urban parks and gardens as the context for many civic buildings. Alternatives to perimeter walls and fences are achieved through landscape design.
Evocative Design
The chancery building is a transparent, crystalline cube atop a colonnade, simultaneously efficient and evocative. Its surface is given form through the interface between a faceted external solar shading and collection system and the blast resistant glazing. A four-sided colonnade forms the base of the building, an accessible and sheltering form that has long evoked the architecture of democracy.
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