Merrill Lynch Headquarters
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The European Headquarters of Merrill Lynch
David Churchill/Arcaid (website) Download Original
Headquarters to provide Merrill Lynch with high quality office space, two of Europe's largest trading floors and client and amenity spaces in four buildings
The building height was determined by St Paul’s Cathedral and the basement depth by the Post Office railway tunnel systems. These constraints heavily influenced the M & E plant location and form. Careful attention had to be paid to external noise as there are sensitive buildings adjacent to the site and the plant operates continuously.
The former Post Office building on King Edward Street has been refurbished, with the imposing colonnaded hall at street level restored for conferencing space and a small display about the history of the site, open to the public.
The architecture has a clear expression of structure but clad in brick and stone so that the frame, rather than the glazing, is the dominant element.
The buildings frame a series of public and communal spaces, which open up what was a closed site. A green central quadrangle between the main and west blocks can be accessed from the west and south, where a new public route runs behind the restored Newgate Street shops.
The focus of the development for those who work there is the glazed galleria which flanks the main block, extending east-west through the site.
Data
- Begun: Jan 1999
- Completed: Oct 2001
- Floor area: 77,000m2
- Sector: Office
- Tender date: 1997
- Procurement: Construction Management
- Address: 2 King Edward Street, London, EC1A 1HQ, United Kingdom
Professional Team 
- Architect: Swanke Hayden Connell Architects
- Project architects: David Walker, James Elliott, Mike King, Ray Pinches, Robert Fry, Sharon Turner
- Client: Merrill Lynch Europe
- Project manager: GTMS
- Quantity surveyor: Gardiner & Theobald
- Structural engineer: Arup
- Archaeology and geotechnics: Arup
- M&E consultant: Arup
- Acoustics: Arup
- Fire engineer: Arup
- Construction manager: Mace
- Planning consultant: Montagu Evans
- Landscape architect: Townshend Landscape Architects
- Urban Design : Richard Coleman Consultancy
- Site Acquisition Advisor: Knight Frank
- Lighting consultant: Equation Lighting
Suppliers
- Facade access systems: Facade Hoists
- Architectural metalwork: Glazzard (Dudley)
- Purbeck stone flooring: W J Haysom & Son
- Cladding: Schmidlin (UK)