Since the opening of Tate Modern at Bankside, the old Tate (Sidney Smith, 1897, with additional 1937 Duveen sculpture galleries by Romaine Walker and John Russell Pope; Llewellyn Davies et al’s 1979 galleries; and the Stirling Wilford Clore Gallery) has reinvented itself as the Tate Britain and has been provided with new galleries and a new west side entrance designed by John Miller (whilst Allies and Morrison handled the external landscaping).
The Miller design adds about one third to the gallery accommodation (the refurbishment of five galleries and the addition of nine new ones), but this has been seamlessly handled so as to blend in with the old building. The heart of the work is a new, spacious entrance hall with a grand staircase. In all, it’s an interesting and finely crafted mix of gallery motifs, taking from Smith, from Stirling and possibly a variety of other sources. Oddly, this almost detracts from the merits, identity and potential uniqueness of Miller’s work. Nevertheless, it all adds up to a reinvigorated Millbank Tate that has won a lot of converts favouring this building rather than the Herzog & de Meuron building.
From here it is easy to visit the Chelsea Art College, the Millbank estate, Darbourne & Darke’s Lillington estate, and George Street’s St. James the Less — continuing up to Victoria as an option. Alternatively continuing the river walk, you can cross Vauxhall Bridge to MI6, EPR’s housing and the Amp interchange, continuing east to Lambeth.
Top: inside one of the gallery spaces, looking out to the new entry stair
Above: axonometric of the area of Miller’s additions and alterations.
Below: the new main entry stair leading up to the gallery floor from the lobby. Left: old and new gallery spaces.
There is a skill to the understated landscaping design of the Clore’s (much neglected) entry forecourt which is important to one’s arrival at the building’s gaping mouth.
Part of the fun of the Clore is Stirling s gamesmanship, played out externally in relation to the classical features of the original building; and played out internally in the manner in which the visitor enters the building. It is as if the architect had sought out areas of a tight brief in which he could play, away from the burden of debate and controversy characterising the internals.
The Clore Gallery (Stirling Wilford Associates, 1986 ) is a skilled 3200 sq. m. addition to Sidney Smith’s 1897 edifice funded by the sugar magnate, Henry Tate, and designed to house the Gallery’s Turner collection. The building sits quietly in a corner of the Tate entrance garden, looking somewhat forlorn and out of fashion — but this does not take away from the interest it holds — much of it based on the fact that Stirling was highly constrained.
The budget was tight and the client’s brief very specific (room layouts, their sequence, a principal level as the existing galleries, etc.). Perhaps as a consequence, one feels Stirling searching out room to manoeuvre that could engage his penchant for architectural gamesmanship without encroaching into areas of performative contention — a classic case of the architect reframing a project and posing his own problems.
Much of this begins on the pavement as an understated approach through a landscaped forecourt.
We then find that the fagade quietly integrates itself with other buildings on the site by picking up their key formal features (the classical language, red brick and Portland stone), incorporating them and then quickly abstracting and intruding upon their influences. Characteristic Stirling trademarks include notes of irreverence which delight, for example, in using an acid-green he must have known most people dislike. He plays a mild joke with what is ostensibly the structural grid of the fagade and then gives the deceit away at the corner and even attempts a joke with corner windows which thinly refer back to ‘missing’ stonework in his Stuttgart art gallery (1984).
The internal organisation includes an arrival axis at 90 degrees to a series of events (a minor, compressed architectural promenade) which includes a brightly coloured, top-lit staircase and a proscenium arch leading into the gallery rooms. Sadly, the latter have now been altered to remove the carpet, change the controversial beige fabric wall colouring and remove a screened seating area formerly overlooking the understated landscaped forecourt.
Recent improvements to the landscaping around the Tate (by Allies & Morrison) have made quite a difference to the setting of the Clore. However, there have succeeded in rearranging the garden so that the original, formal arrival and approach axis promoted by Stirling has been rudely overlaid by a new axis between his fagade and the main road. For the garden in general, this is an improvement; for the Stirling schema it is not.
The Millbank Estate that sits behind the Tate Britain (right), was completed by the London County Council (LCC) Architect’s Department in 1903, following its very first estate in Shoreditch (the Boundary estate). Further north, in Page Street and Vincent Street, SW1, there is a large estate designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens (1928-30). It’s a curious design, the fagades being patterned with a now fashionable off-set motif. Apart from that, both schemes are worth looking at if you are interested in housing and apartment blocks for families.
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