Morning everyone...
I was going through my photos and realised I had taken a photo of the iMax (Waterloo "square" I should say) on my way to meetings at multiple times of the year but had not shared them yet in a post.... Why would I? You may ask...
I find a drum building in a roundabout quite amusing (because it is very literal).. And have since it was built back in the turn of the turn of the millennium. I particularly find the network of paths that provide access to it amusing. But also how despite its geometry, it does no feel permanently in this context.
I think this is partly due to the ever changing displays behind the hoarding like facade but mostly because it is surrounded by moving traffic and feels like an object that sits there for the time being... When you stand there (not that you would need to unless you cycle, like I do and need to incorporate to the incoming traffic) it feels like an odd location.
The drum , technically a ground breaker in the context of its function when it first opened, is surrounded by static old , modern and brutalist buildings of varying scales, and the dynamic traffic.
I remember back in Ken Livingstone times a competition with winners announced in the middle of the recession under Boris (in his role as London Mayor)...then silence And with all the changes that are surrounding Waterloo, I am secretly hoping that some actual urban planning takes place and we see a reconfiguration because it really feels off to emerge from the Southbank centre and its public realm to this island building.
If you haven't looked at it yet ... When you do, let me know whether you get the same feeling.
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