Will the Shard Ever Be Ready?

When the Sellar Group was commissioned to alter the London skyline in 2006, I can’t imagine
the world was taken aback.

I like a landmark as much as the next man, but I’ve yet to get excited about another structure appearing on the streets of London that neither changes my life nor inspires the architect in
me. (In fact, I’m not sure I have any architect in me at all – unless a Lego fetish counts?)

The Shard, like many London monuments of modern times, has been marketed as a city lifestyle on steroids. It’ll give you everything you need and more, although I’m pretty sure no-one needs a 360 degree view of all the other sky scrapers battling space on the horizon. Find me someone who wants to live, work, gym and dine out in the same building and I’ll find you an architect crazy enough to build a 1,000 foot greenhouse on the bank of the Thames.

I don’t know what takes so long to build these monstrosities anyway, the first crane appeared in 2009 and it’s still not ready! Commission a block of new-build council houses and they’re up in days.

I suppose with such an apparently prestigious task they can take forever and no one bats an eyelid. It’ll be oh so delightful when it’s finished, the Shardists (that’s right, I’ve nicknamed them) are more than happy to wait in awe for the builders to put down their mugs and actually do some work.

It probably doesn’t help that I have a general hatred for builders on most building sites in London anyway…all that leering is enough to put anyone off their Starbucks.

I’d also like to know how much 11,000 glass panels costs – I hope none of my taxes have gone into their purchase. I’ll bet Boris has put his hand in his pocket, or at least offered tax relief – he loves a romantic gesture when it comes to London and its place on the architectural map.

All this fuss over the tallest building in Europe? Personally, I’d rather be up the Eiffel tower.

Image by Ell Brown courtesy of Flickr