Earls Court site panorama, on “The Table”, looking approximately North. Temporary BBC Experience under construction in foreground.

Earls Court site panorama – TfL’s Lillie Bridge Depot

Earls Court is one of those projects that keeps on giving. We wrote about the shenanigans surrounding former owners CAPCO at the hand of a well-known former prime minister, while reviewing 25 years of property development in one of our 2021 lockdown projects.

Background

Earls Court Crane March 2017 [Keltbray]

Earls Court and Earls Court 2 were totally demolished over the period 2015-18, leaving the huge empty, but complicated, 40 acre site pictured, straddling our borough and adjacent RBKC. At a stated demolition cost of £97M, needing the world’s largest crane to lift 61 of the up to 1500 tonne beams, this and other factors inevitably broke the former owners, never mind the carbon budget, with over 15,000 tonnes of concrete beams removed.

On the LBHF side, there was a long-running battle over ownership of the social housing – Gibbs Green and West Ken. estates – which were once sold to CAPCO and eventually returned in a deal with Delancey and the council in 2019.  The net effect is that by not involving the adjacent estates, this master-plan covers the smaller area of 40 acres compared to the original CAPCO proposal that foundered, covering around 80 acres. According to some resident representatives we met, the condition of parts of these estates remains poor.

Enter the Earls Court Development company (“ECDC”) with Delancey and others joining forces with TfL again. The recent site walk showed us just how much railway there is around and under Earls Court, and why little can be done without TfL involvement. Blessed with a station at each corner (Earls Court, West Brompton and West Ken.), the site unsurprisingly benefits from the maximum 6b PTAL rating.

Over the last couple of years, ECDC have run a number of workshops and local community engagement exercises to steer the master-plan, several of which we advertised to members and/or attended. Now it’s ready for all to see, and exhibition details appear in our diary (starting 23rd Feb), together with a webinar and public meeting date.

Earls Court model looking approximately SW. The white translucent model (foreground) is the consented Tesco redevelopment (100 West Cromwell Road)

The scale of the proposed development is as immense as earlier the demolition task, with buildings up to 39 storeys around the existing landmark Empress State Building (ESB) shown, itself 31 storeys high.  In West London, this makes the proposed tall buildings second-only to the North Acton towers  – no boasting matter.

Railways

The model shows that the masterplan uses much of the railway and existing infrastructure to guide new structure placement – the routes through the site are predominately directly above the tunnels which are only just below the surface and insufficiently strong to be built on.  A pleasing advantage of this more carbon-friendly approach, is that the routes have to be curved, indeed some of the smaller scale housing in the foreground (above) is in crescent format, the like of which we’ve rarely seen since the brutalist Hulme or Golden Lane crescents of the 60’s, or subsequently more successfully at the Barbican.

“The Table” is a concrete cover over part of the West London Line that bifurcates the site, forms the borough boundaries and was the camera location for the above panoramas. Built as part of the base for former Earls Court 2, it’s of unknown strength and therefore assumed too weak to be built on, but forms an above/below grade datum for much of the site. Servicing of all varieties is most definitely below stairs.

Tall buildings

Earls Court model looking North (Lillie Road runs across the centre of the picture)

Since last summer’s workshops, we’ve been aware of the plan to locate tall buildings near the Empress, which seems a slightly odd choice – either attempting to disguise their bulk, or to hide the most architecturally interesting tall building in the borough, complete with its private revolving bar, and Wilkinson Eyre-designed 3 storey glass top extension. If the new buildings were subservient, its glass topknot forming the glittering crown of a rejuvenated neighbourhood, one could perhaps understand.  But that’s just not the modern idiom – one that so often feels the need to shout – louder and taller! The location adjacent to the A4 at the north end of the site, next to the already-consented Tesco development at 100 West Cromwell Road (shown in translucent white in the model) might fit better than overshadowing the Empress and its very much smaller neighbours. Tesco will have buildings of up to 29 storeys (above podium) and 462 flats.

A new Earls Court?

Aside from housing, inevitably mostly comprising flats, there are loose plans for cultural venues and amenities, without a particularly strong vision or identity, despite a recognition that “culture has been the beating heart of Earls Court for over 150 years”. In the cavernous former basement/pool areas, sitting over 11m below “The Table”, there remains the enticing opportunity for the rebirth of a decent sized venue, recreating a worthwhile portion of the former Earls Court, a facility since gifted to the O2 Arena. This would capitalise on the excellent PTAL, and provide a strong identity, rather than a range of smaller venues envisaged, of which London already has plenty. Others are currently building larger venues around Stratford, such is the shortage, but they don’t have the enviable history – or name. It would be a travesty to create a soulless underground labyrinth of loading bays instead, which appears to be the current plan.

On a slightly different tack, with the departure of Sir Simon Rattle after the City pulled the plug on his dream venue two years ago, the LSO is still looking for a good performance space. There are plenty of relevant local connections, with the Royal College of Music one tube stop away, and its halls of residence, Prince Consort Village, in Goldhawk Road.

Conclusion

Earls Court defunct CAPCO scheme (2013)

There is no getting way from the fact that this has the potential to be another significantly overbuilt generic “mixed-use” site, maximising developer return by cramming 4500 homes onto it, though the company strenuously denies it, and  instead emphasises a park “the size of Trafalgar Square” in the centre of the site – the headline to much exhibition material in a so-called “landscape-led approach”. But density is confirmed by checking the numbers. On the raw numbers, this proposal is, on average, 20% denser than the now derided former CAPCO scheme: 4500 homes in 40 acres, vs. 7500 in 80 acres for CAPCO, and a quick visual comparison of the models tends to support this.  However it may be very much denser on the Hammersmith side due to the location of the high-rises. Neither we, nor LBHF planners, have exact numbers, and we are further investigating.

Wonder of the original Earls Court [Dave Hill]

Overall, this is familiar consultation material, including the sustainability statements, 35% “affordable” provision and so on, much of it in any case already mandated by the London Plan.

Despite a stated desire to “reinstate wonder”, so far we’re not seeing the expected strong identity or wonder afforded by the name Earls Court, and an opportunity is possibly being missed of a (rein)statement entrance at Warwick road, where, we’re told, the original steps still remain. Instead a small open space (“Warwick Road Square”) leads to a funnel between two anonymous blocks according to the model.

In reviewing the park, it appears to run the real risk of being neither fish not foul, aping the slim pickings similarly offered at Westfield Residential and others, neither big enough for a game of football, nor small enough to generate a reasonable sense of enclosure, despite, or perhaps because of, the overbearing towers. This needs addressing, because much of the masterplan revolves around it.

We think that with a clean-sheet site – notwithstanding railways – there is a real opportunity to do something special with sitewide energy provision too. Few sites have such an opportunity to source heat from deep underground, and/or use the unwanted heat from those railways, and to build required infrastructure before buildings. ECDC are considering something like this with mention of “a large scale zero-carbon energy network”, and we expect to see much more detail as the plans are developed, and before ground is broken.  An initial hybrid planning application is expected by the end of 2023.

We encourage you to visit the exhibition which is in the former Met. Police Heritage Centre next to the bus turnaround in Lillie Road, and then please let us know what you think. Meanwhile here’s a taster of the exhibition boards in our ‘virtual exhibition’, or you can download the presentation.