Barbican Centre

Barbican Centre, arts complex in the City of London built to incorporate a concert hall, two theatres, three cinemas, a library, art gallery, and conference halls. The massive structure, consisting of ten storeys, some of them underground, was designed in 1952 by Chamberlin, Powell & Bon in a Modernist style. It opened in 1982, when it also became the home of the London Symphony Orchestra. For 20 years (1982-2002) it was also the London base of the Royal Shakespeare Company.

The Barbican Centre was constructed within a larger development, occupying land that had been extensively bombed in World War II. The main feature of the development was its residential accommodation, in both high tower blocks and long, low-rise blocks connected by a series of high-level walkways, separating pedestrians from the subterranean and ground-level traffic. Placed at the centre of the development was a large rectangular artificial lake, flanked by the Barbican Centre, the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, the City of London School for Girls, and the medieval church of St Giles Cripplegate at one end, and three of the low-rise residential blocks at the other, with a fourth block suspended above the lake itself, midway along its length. St Giles was the only pre-existing building retained within the development, so its site was a fixed point around which the other buildings and features were designed. The Barbican complex was granted Grade II listed status in 2001.