Winning Design by Kieran Timberlake
The design for the new US Embassy in London has been announced and it could not be more disappointing. This isn’t to say that the architect isn’t a talented architect, its the choosing of this design out of what they had to choose from that makes me question their sanity. The final four included designs from Morphosis, Richard Meier and Pei Cobb Freed & Partners.
Moving from its current location in a Saarinen building on Grosvenor Square to a new spot on the Thames, the official selection is by architect Kieran Timberlake who to his credit has done some really nice work, including the Loblolly House in Maryland, buildings at Yale and Cornell and a home for the Make It Right project in New Orleans. Yet, the design for the embassy isn’t great. It is cold, corporate and very uninteresting, which I can only assume is a result of what the state department asked for.
The disappointment here lies in what this choice projects. For a building that is supposed to represent not only American strength but its creativity and culture, why choose something that speaks so much to the opposite, a lack of culture and a focus on corporate and capitalism. I certainly hope that Londoners can look past this choice…
For more:
NYT: A New Fort, er, Embassy, for London
Proposed Design by Richard Meier
- Proposed Design by Morphosis
