It is galling to see the Peninsula Hotel taking shape on Hyde Park Corner; no, it’s infuriating.
It is a big box, architecturally, but does not seek to make a statement nor does it dare to overlook the garden of Buckingham Palace. This is in contrast to the tower likely to be built at the edge of the now ludicrously named Barons Court Conservation Area. It will be the tallest building in Hammersmith and three times taller than the new Peninsula hotel which will look like this.
Later I walked up Davies Street on my way to lunch at the Savile. I like the sandstone cladding on this newish building and found the quotations are, in translation, by Louis-Antoine Saint-Just, the “Angel of Death” responsible for my aunt being guillotined.
Charlotte de Rutant was executed in Paris on 6th October, 1793. It is a small consolation that Saint-Just followed her to the guillotine, alongside Robespierre, the following year.
It is an act of hubris to have an ostentatious office in such an expensive location and then to adorn it with quotes by an 18th century Hans Frank – so who are Lansdowne Partners? They are a hedge fund of some twenty-two years that blazed through the financial firmament and have now fallen from grace. They closed their £2.8 billion flagship fund last month – it had lost 23% in the first half of this year. In contrast Scottish Mortgage is up more than 40% this year – will it crash and burn too? Possibly, but the discipline imposed by Baillie Gifford may avert disaster.
If any readers have also lost family members in the Great Terror I invite them to join me in an (Upper) Class Action against Lansdowne Partners for their insensitivity to our bereavement.
Regarding your unspoken but implied criticisms of current architectural projects, I think the answer is that most architects and planners are now taught that the appearance of a building is of no importance