2 Marsham Street
Encyclopedia
Home Office
The Home Office is the United Kingdom government department responsible for immigration control, security, and order. As such it is responsible for the police, UK Border Agency, and the Security Service . It is also in charge of government policy on security-related issues such as drugs,...
, a department of the British Government, since March 2005. Before this date the Home Office was located at 50 Queen Anne's Gate
50 Queen Anne's Gate
102 Petty France is an office block on Petty France in Westminster, London, overlooking St. James's Park, which was designed by Fitzroy Robinson & Partners, with Sir Basil Spence and completed in 1976. It was well-known as the main location for the UK Home Office department between 1978 and 2004...
.
History
The site was previously occupied by the Departments of Environment and Transport. The headquarters offices of both departments were located in Marsham TowersMarsham Towers
The Marsham Towers were three towers at the corner of Marsham Street and Great Peter Street in Westminster, London. They served as the headquarters of the Department of the Environment.-Redevelopment:The redevelopment of the site was long planned...
- three 20-floor concrete towers (North, Centre and South) joined together by 'podium' floors to level 3. The towers won an architectural award and boasted express lifts, marble entrances and escalators to the 3rd floor - very modern government offices for the early 1970s. Construction had started in the early 1960s but was finally completed in 1971 and became the office of the new Department of Environment created in October 1970 (DOE was created out of a merger between the Ministry for Housing and Local Government and the Ministry of Transport).
The towers were considered by some to be a blot on London's landscape and were subsequently nicknamed "the three ugly sisters" and "the toast rack". Michael Heseltine, when the Secretary of State for the Environment in the late 1970s/early 1980s, allegedly said that the building offered the best view of London - because you couldn't see the towers from his north-facing 16th floor North tower office.
The last government staff occupied the building in the late 1990s. The towers were demolished in 2003 to make way for the new building into which the Home Office moved into in 2005. Prior to the ugly sisters epoch, from about 1818, the site housed the Chartered Gas Works of the Westminster Gas Light and Coke Company
Gas Light and Coke Company
The Gas Light and Coke Company , was a company that made and supplied coal gas and coke. The Company was located on Horseferry Road in Westminster, London...
, as well as a laundry yard.
Design
Designed by Terry FarrellTerry Farrell (architect)
Sir Terry Farrell, CBE, RIBA, FRSA, FCSD, MRTPI is a British architect.-Life and career:Farrell was born in Sale, Cheshire. As a youth he moved to Newcastle upon Tyne, where he attended St Cuthbert's High School. He graduated with a degree from Newcastle University, followed by a Masters in urban...
, the new building was financed through the Private Finance Initiative
Private Finance Initiative
The private finance initiative is a way of creating "public–private partnerships" by funding public infrastructure projects with private capital...
model with French construction firm Bouygues
Bouygues
Bouygues S.A. is a French industrial group headquartered in the 8th arrondissement of Paris, France. Bouygues is listed on Euronext Paris exchange and is a blue chip in the CAC 40 stock market index. The company was founded in 1952 by Francis Bouygues and since 1989 has been led by his son Martin...
as contractor. It was completed within 34 months. The cost of £311 million will be spread over 29 years and will be partially met by the issue of bonds. The site is made up of three buildings, designated Seacole, Peel and Fry. They are named after Mary Jane Seacole
Mary Seacole
Mary Jane Seacole , sometimes known as Mother Seacole or Mary Grant, was a Jamaican nurse best known for her involvement in the Crimean War. She set up and operated boarding houses in Panama and the Crimea to assist in her desire to treat the sick...
, Robert Peel
Robert Peel
Sir Robert Peel, 2nd Baronet was a British Conservative statesman who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 10 December 1834 to 8 April 1835, and again from 30 August 1841 to 29 June 1846...
and Elizabeth Fry
Elizabeth Fry
Elizabeth Fry , née Gurney, was an English prison reformer, social reformer and, as a Quaker, a Christian philanthropist...
, figures who had significant impacts in areas within the Home Office's responsibility. The Marsham Street development also includes a block of residential flats, shops and restaurants.
The buildings are connected by a bridge from the 1st to the 4th floors, forming part of a corridor that runs the whole length of the building. Staff call this corridor 'The Street'. During design, the emphasis was on creating a building with a community feel. To that end, the open-plan offices are well lit, situated around three central atria and overlooking turfed 'pocket parks'. The building has also been constructed to be energy efficient and to fall well within government energy-expenditure targets. The approachable effect of the building is enhanced by art-work by Liam Gillick
Liam Gillick
Liam Gillick is a British conceptual artist who lives in New York City. He is often associated with the artists included the 1996 exhibit Traffic, which first introduced the term Relational Art.-Life and career:...
who used coloured glass to change the feel of the building depending on the light conditions.
The site contains 46,500 m² (500,522 sq ft) of office space.
Critical reception
Since its completion in early 2005, 2 Marsham Street has been well received by the architectural community winning an RIBA Award for Architecture, a Leading European Architects Forum and MIPIM 2006 Awards. The contractor's provision of the building within the time-frame required has also been praised. http://www.hughpearman.com/articles5/homeoffice.html The Home SecretaryHome Secretary
The Secretary of State for the Home Department, commonly known as the Home Secretary, is the minister in charge of the Home Office of the United Kingdom, and one of the country's four Great Offices of State...
at the time of the building's completion, Charles Clarke
Charles Clarke
Charles Rodway Clarke is a British Labour Party politician, who was the Member of Parliament for Norwich South from 1997 until 2010, and served as Home Secretary from December 2004 until May 2006.-Early life:...
, has stated "By moving to a newer, more efficient headquarters, the Home Office will save taxpayers around £95m. This will contribute to the Home Office's programme to save £1.97bn so that we can target more money at front line services like policing and border control." http://www.publicservice.co.uk/readnews.asp?id=659