Two large, and not much loved, office blocks that stood at Euston station have been demolished to make way for the new HS2 station.
The two towers – Jan 2018 (c) Google Street View
They’ve been under demolition for some time, but the process reached the ground level last week, marking the completion of that phase of the demolition works. To enable the demolition to be carried out, the buildings were covered within an acoustic wrap, and then excavators with breaking and munching attachments worked down the building from the roof demolishing floor by floor.
Top of Grant Thornton House Sept 2019 (c) HS2
The final stage of the works was to demolish the huge 2.7-metre thick One Euston Square first floor slab. This was completed in two stages. Firstly two 45-tonne excavators with breaking attachments were lifted on to the slab with a 450-tonne mobile crane. These machines removed 60% of the slab working from the top. Once complete they were lifted down and the works were completed using a 45-tonne and 60-tonne excavator from ground level.
To cut down on lorries, a lot of the waste is being reused on-site to build the new station rather than being carted away for landfill.
Euston EWC Towers Demolition July 2020 (c) HS2
The two old office blocks were designed by the modernist architect Richard Seifert, and were supposed to be part of a larger office development in the area, but plans were changed in the late 1970s, leaving just these two monoliths standing alone.
While much of Seifert’s work has been positively reappraised in recent years, these two dark grey forbidding looking rectangles never gained many fans.
Seifert’s finest London building remains, of course, the Camdem Pirate Castle.
I worked in One Euston Square for a couple of years, only a few years ago. Strange to think that’s it’s now gone. Ironically one of the tenants on the other floors was HS2 Ltd…
The Seifert office complex originally comprised 3 mid rise rectangualar office blocks and a three storey link office block raised on columns, constructed 1974-78. Here is a link to an article about the complex from the 20thC Society:
https://c20society.org.uk/building-of-the-month/euston-station-london
Thanks for a very civilised appreciation of just the features of the station which I have loved since it was built. The missing bit is the parcels office: that vast slab over the platforms which accounts for the dark arrival experience you describe. That vast heroic space has not been seriously used for decades and could so easily have become the shopping mall which is clearly every British railway manager’s dream.
This is nonsense. These blocks were never loved and made the approach to Euston station confusing, and certainly made me feel unsafe.
Who said the buildings were loved?
Well, I liked them. I agree the entrance to Euston was a dogs dinner and the towers didn’t help. But viewed objectively on their own terms I enjoyed them. I agree probably not worth mourning…although I guess it will depend what replaces them…
I do find myself missing more and more some of the post war buildings that have have no gone…. none more so than the bank of England extension on New Change – I thought that was actually beautiful….
Not just where a new HS2 station is to be built where the towers are to be knocked down. There’s also work happening with the new HS2 tunnel near Rickmansworth in Hertfordshire and there has been backlash with the protesters who don’t want the HS2 tunnel to be built.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-55207108
I used to work in Grant Thornton House, and am delighted to see these photographs of its demolition. Many thanks.