Stock Exchange Tower
Encyclopedia
City of London
The City of London is a small area within Greater London, England. It is the historic core of London around which the modern conurbation grew and has held city status since time immemorial. The City’s boundaries have remained almost unchanged since the Middle Ages, and it is now only a tiny part of...
at 125 Old Broad Street.
History
Standing at 100 metres (328 ft) tall, with 26 floors, the tower was completed by Trollope & CollsTrollope & Colls
Trollope & Colls was once one of the United Kingdom's largest construction companies.-History:The Company was formed out of the merger of George Trollope & Sons and Colls & Sons .The merged firm started to specialise in civil engineering and during World War...
in 1970 and opened by the Queen
Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom
Elizabeth II is the constitutional monarch of 16 sovereign states known as the Commonwealth realms: the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Jamaica, Barbados, the Bahamas, Grenada, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Belize,...
in 1972. It served as the headquarters and offices for the London Stock Exchange
London Stock Exchange
The London Stock Exchange is a stock exchange located in the City of London within the United Kingdom. , the Exchange had a market capitalisation of US$3.7495 trillion, making it the fourth-largest stock exchange in the world by this measurement...
until its departure for new premises in Paternoster Square
Paternoster Square
Paternoster Square is an urban development, owned by the Mitsubishi Estate Co., next to St Paul's Cathedral in the City of London, England. In 1942 the area, which takes its name from Paternoster Row, centre of the London publishing trade, was devastated by aerial bombardment in The Blitz during...
in July 2004. Face to face trading was conducted on the trading floor of the exchange until it was abolished in favour of electronic trading in the 1986 deregulation of the London Stock Exchange known as Big Bang
Big Bang (financial markets)
The phrase Big Bang, used in reference to the sudden deregulation of financial markets, was coined to describe measures, including abolition of fixed commission charges and of the distinction between stockjobbers and stockbrokers on the London Stock Exchange and change from open-outcry to...
.
On 20 July 1990 the Provisional Irish Republican Army
Provisional Irish Republican Army
The Provisional Irish Republican Army is an Irish republican paramilitary organisation whose aim was to remove Northern Ireland from the United Kingdom and bring about a socialist republic within a united Ireland by force of arms and political persuasion...
exploded a bomb inside the tower, causing its evacuation. The bomb destroyed the public viewing areas in the building which subsequently closed in 1992. The tower was also evacuated on September 11, 2001 after the attacks on the World Trade Center
World Trade Center
The original World Trade Center was a complex with seven buildings featuring landmark twin towers in Lower Manhattan, New York City, United States. The complex opened on April 4, 1973, and was destroyed in 2001 during the September 11 attacks. The site is currently being rebuilt with five new...
, The Pentagon
The Pentagon
The Pentagon is the headquarters of the United States Department of Defense, located in Arlington County, Virginia. As a symbol of the U.S. military, "the Pentagon" is often used metonymically to refer to the Department of Defense rather than the building itself.Designed by the American architect...
and Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania
The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...
.
Renovation
The building underwent a major renovation which saw its pre-cast concrete façade reclad in a high-performance glass curtain wallCurtain wall
A curtain wall is an outer covering of a building in which the outer walls are non-structural, but merely keep out the weather. As the curtain wall is non-structural it can be made of a lightweight material reducing construction costs. When glass is used as the curtain wall, a great advantage is...
, and thousands of square metres more office space created, including a new 10-story office building at 60 Threadneedle Street, a 6 story wing to the east, and a single-story wing in the northwest. As part of the renovation, the floor plates were extended beyond the perimeter of the original building to give more overall space. The renovation scheme was designed by GMW Architects.
The building has eleven 17-person passenger lifts and 1 goods lift, as well as firefighting lifts and vehicle shuttle lifts.