Faryners House is located at the intersection of Monument Street, Botolph Lane and Pudding Lane, within the Central Activities Zone. The existing building is seven storeys of vacant commercial floorspace.
To the west of the site lies Monument Square and the Grade I Listed Monument, designed by Christopher Wren and Robert Hooke in memory of The Great Fire. On Botolph Lane to the east, there are a number of commercial properties and residential apartments.
The building was designed in the late 1960s and completed in the 1970s. It features a concrete structure with bulky and deteriorating concrete cladding panels creating a defensive and insular character. Its low ceilings, outdated building form and poor sustainability performance means the building provides very substandard office space.
Faryners House is in need of significant investment to create a building that will provide the quality of modern office space that occupants require with enhanced sustainability and improved relationship with its neighbours and public realm.
Faryners House is named after Thomas Farriner (Faryner), a baker whose bakery in Pudding Lane was potentially the starting point for the Great Fire of London in 1666. The claimed source of the fire lies just south of the site boundary – this can be seen on the adjacent image, highlighted by the red cross. The rear of the premises formerly at 23 Pudding Lane now sits in the centre of Monument Street.
The existing 1970s building reflects its age. The reinforced concrete structure is clad with deteriorating concrete panels, giving the building an outdated and poor-quality aesthetic. It creates an uninviting and defensive relationship with the area, contributing little to its surroundings.
The building’s form and the mechanical systems (i.e., heating, ventilation and air conditioning) that service it, are outdated and inefficient. As a result, it is highly unsustainable with poor energy performance, and no greening or biodiversity. The internal office space, with low ceilings and dated layouts adds to the building’s poor quality.
Following a thorough assessment of the building’s future options, a full redevelopment of the site above ground is the only option that can adequately address the aforementioned. The vision for Faryners House is to create a new highly sustainable building that recognises the area’s history and provides significant public realm benefits.
The proposals to transform Faryners House are being led by an experienced project team, including industry leaders such as Fletcher Priest Architects, Gerald Eve and M3 Consulting.
Fletcher Priest is a cosmopolitan, award-winning design practice known for their workplace, residential, retail and cultural buildings. Their practice is made up of people from around the world with many areas of expertise including masterplanning, architecture, interior design, design research, graphic design, furniture and product design, illustration, photography and film.
Fletcher Priest is a highly collaborative practice, led by a widely respected, talented and knowledgeable partnership group. Since the practice’s foundation in 1978, they have worked with the City of London to complete a number of award-winning projects for a variety of organisations.
Gerald Eve are one of the UK’s most-respected planning and development consultancies, working with leading private, public and third sector clients on some of the most high profile and complex projects in the country.
They engage actively across the political landscape to create solutions that benefit all stakeholders, with their agile approach and integrated advice adding clear value to landowners, the projects themselves and the communities where they are located.
M3 Consulting is a specialist development management and project management business. They advise on, lead and manage all aspects of property and development, from inception, land assembly and design, through town planning, third party, legals, and construction.
Offering flexible development management and project management expertise, M3 have shaped, nurtured and delivered some of London’s most successful buildings and places. Their experience spans through all stages of the project lifecycle, fusing commercial awareness, technical know-how and instinctive people skills to unlock value and make great places.
