18/09/2017 / Blog

Open House London 2017

Now in its 25th year, Open House London saw the addition of The Ampersand Building on Wardour Street in Soho, the first Darling Associates project to feature in London’s biggest architecture festival.

Darling Associates Project Director Tibor Szakaly discusses The Ampersand Building for Open House London

The weekend featured two guided tours, led by Darling Associates architects Tibor Szakaly and Akos Sofalvi, who had helped to deliver the Soho scheme, now the London HQ for ‘Candy Crush’ creator, King Games. Members of the public were able to get a glimpse of how the building was adapted into 64,500 sq ft of prime office and residential building in the heart of Soho.

The project, located at 178-180 Wardour Street, is an extensive refurbishment of an existing mixed-use building and the external retrofit of the building’s façade. The project comprises 4 floors of grade A office space, with two penthouse floors containing 10 luxury apartments located on the 5th and 6th floor.

Ampersand was conceived through a creative collaboration between architect, artist and graphic designer leading to a project that embodies Soho’s unique character of commerce and creativity. In refurbishing rather than rebuilding, this design has enhanced the heritage of this West End location, restored an important Oxford Street elevation, greatly reduced the embodied energy of the scheme, enabled a continuous retail offer at street level throughout the build and created a finished product that is immediately at home in its surroundings.

Ampersand is a signature, contemporary transformation of a landmark building. From the dynamic entrance façade, to the dramatic staircase within the Atrium, to the distinctive Grade A office space, our dedicated design focus is first and foremost to create an inspirational working environment. With this project, the team saw an opportunity to breathe new life into an existing building, retaining the primary fabric and historic façade, exposing its innate qualities and applying a new envelope fit for the expectations of the sustainable future of commercial office provision in this progressive area of the city.