The Standard
Creating a category-disrupting hotel in a former town hall
A first for Orms The Standard is our first hotel project. It has led to several more, and stands to demonstrate our belief that special, memorable places for living and leisure can be created out of buildings originally designed for other uses. While others bidding for the site opted for new-build schemes, our client – Crosstree – saw the potential for reuse, bringing us on board because of our success in securing planning on other complicated sites in Camden – and elsewhere in London’s West End.
Aerial view of the site prior to redevelopment.
Site plan showing the location on the active Euston Road, with St Pancras Station opposite and lower-density school and residential areas to the rear of the site.
General arrangement plan of a typical floor from the original scheme, designed as an extension to Camden Town Hall.
Camden Town Hall details of structural precast concrete frames.
We were one of a number of bidders for this site but nobody else looked at it as a refurb as opposed to a knock down and rebuild... When we started to discuss the building with locals, especially those to the south of the site, everybody seemed to love it... We felt [retaining it] was the right thing to do – not just for our use but also for the local residents and of course from a sustainability point of view. Matt Mason, Client (Crosstree Real Estate Partners)
Setting a Standard Our canvas was a 1970s Brutalist building on Euston Road, opposite St Pancras railway station. It was designed as an annexe to Camden Town Hall next door but had become unpopular, being seen as making a negative contribution to the conservation area to the south. Studies by Crosstree showed that a hotel would work well here, with the site’s proximity to transport links, King’s Cross and the West End.
View north-west: the existing building (showing proximity to St Pancras Station)
View north-west: showing additional floors
View north-east: existing building
View north-east: proposed building
Creative collaboration Early on, we partnered up with The Standard – a boutique hospitality brand looking to create their first hotel outside the US, and whose founder, Andre Balazs, immediately saw the building’s potential to fit into his portfolio of category-disrupting, one-of-a-kind properties. Orms became lead consultant, taking responsibility for the exterior architecture, collaborating with Shawn Hausman and Archer Humphryes on the interiors.
View from private eighth-floor terrace.
Private terrace with outdoor bath.
Ninth-floor restaurant and bar; the roof terrace is above.
The views to St Pancras Station have become part of the architecture.
Bedrooms feature the building's original waffle-slab structure.
Ground-floor library and lounge space.
Rooftop extrusion To accommodate the hotel’s 266 rooms, we extended the building up by three floors. This was a structural and contextual challenge, resolved through close collaboration with engineers Heyne Tillett Steel. The façade’s existing precast concrete panels are an integral part of the structure and could not be removed without significant remodelling, so we threaded new steel columns in to take the weight of the additional floors. The concrete panels also informed the external form of the building: the new floors read as an extrusion of those below, stepping back in deference to the Grade I-listed St Pancras station opposite.
We collaborated with structural engineers Heyne Tillett Steel to add new steel columns to the existing structure.
These were threaded like needles down through the existing waffle slabs to the first-floor transfer slab and concrete columns below.
The columns needed to be carefully aligned with the ceiling waffles on each floor.
They also had to be incorporated into the build-up of the new dividing walls between bedrooms.
Red is the colour To signal the arrival of The Standard on Euston Road, we designed a pill-shaped shuttle lift that runs up the north elevation to the top-floor bars and restaurant, following a natural break in the massing of the building. Technically complex in its engineering, the lift is exactly the same red colour as London’s famous Routemaster buses (and The Standard branding).
The crowned massing takes inspiration from St Pancras.
The iconic red lift not only matches The Standard's branding, but is also the Orms colour!
The original tinted windows in their distinctive rounded rectangular frames were replaced with clear glass.
On the building's corners, rounded panes with a high-grade acoustic specification were inserted to combat noise from the busy roads below.
Outside space Even in this busy central London location, we have carved out small areas of external space. The ground-floor bars spill out into a garden to the south of the building away from the busy road, part of which has been reinstated as a public right of way. On the eighth floor, bedrooms have private terraces with outside baths, while the ninth and tenth floor bays cantilever out to host a restaurant and bar with a roof terrace above.
Location
Kings Cross, London
Client
Crosstree Real Estate Partners
Date
2017
Borough
Camden