As Liverpool’s world-famous waterfront undergoes its most radical change in a century, Peter Elson and William Leece report on the debate surrounding the new development
TWO years after work started on the £120m redevelopment of the Mann Island site to the south of Liverpool’s Pier Head, the public are starting to take notice.
And although plans were scrutinised carefully and approved by bodies like English Heritage and the Commission from the Built Environment (CABE), public opinion is still split over the changes they will bring to Liverpool’s cityscape.
The three blocks, designed by Broadway Malyan, make up a mixed commercial and residential development, by Neptune Developments, in Liverpool, and the northern office of Countryside Properties, in Warrington.
The site, in the words of its publicists, “will become a vibrant waterfront destination comprising dockside cafes and restaurants, shops, sheltered public spaces, a new exhibition venue, 376 apartments and a 140,000 square feet of high-quality commercial office space.”
Gavin Stamp, trustee and former chairman of the influential 20th Century Society, is unequivocal about the three blocks.
“They should not be built. Not only is this a World Heritage Site, but there needs to be a break between the great 20th century group of the Pier Head’s Three Graces and the 19th-century group of the Albert Dock.
“It was fine as it was before with low-level buildings between the landmark groups, acting as a buffer zone so that neither of those groups are overwhelmed.
“It’s nothing to do with the World Heritage Site holding back development. This is just a very bad idea visually, as it does not respect the character of the place.
“I don’t understand why new office and apartment blocks have to be built in Liverpool, when the city has so many fine old buildings and newer properties lying empty.
“This last building boom in Liverpool has been a disaster. At best there’s a lot of mediocrity, and there’s got to be a higher quality of architecture.”
Mike McDonough, of 21st Century Liverpool, a pressure group to promote forward-thinking ideas for the city, supports the new Mann Island development, however.
“Based on what I see, it’s a really good scheme,” he says.
“There’s been so much criticism about the new buildings, but people forget that the Pier Head Buildings made bold statements in their day.
“These new granite blocks are doing the same thing. The Three Graces have a mixture of three styles and what Liverpool needs is that same bold sense of direction.
“We should stop designing buildings which are over-contextualised in terms of keeping their style quiet, but which stand out in their own right.
‘THAT was what Liverpool adopted in the 1900s when it wanted to show it was far more than just a port full of warehouses.
“The function of this building is apartments and you could argue that we have enough of those already.
“But there has been no end of planning and tweaking of the finished design to ensure that what is being built is complementary to the nearby buildings.
“In the same way, the new Museum of Liverpool complements the Three Graces with its palette to match their stonework. The new museum is admittedly quite large, but it’s needed to do a specific job.
“Interestingly, the previous Mann Island schemes, like Will Alsop’s Cloud and Richard Rogers’s scheme, were far more bold than the present one, yet more people seemed to like them.”
