Lloyd’s building
The Lloyd’s Building (also sometimes known as The Inside-Out Building) is the home of the insurance institution Lloyd’s of London, and is located at One Lime Street, in the City of London, England.
It was designed by architect Richard Rogers and built between 1978 and 1986. Bovis was the management contractor for the scheme. Like the Pompidou Centre (designed by Renzo Piano and Rogers), the building was innovative in having its services such as staircases, lifts, electrical power conduits and water pipes on the outside, leaving an uncluttered space inside. The twelve glass lifts were the first of their kind in the UK.
The building consists of three main towers and three service towers around a central, rectangular space. Its focal point is the large Underwriting Room on the ground floor, which houses the famous Lutine Bell. The Underwriting Room (often simply known as ‘the Room’) is overlooked by galleries, forming a 60 metres (197 ft) high atrium lit naturally through a huge barrel-vaulted glass roof. The first four galleries open onto the atrium space, and are connected by escalators through the middle of the structure. The higher floors are glassed-in, and can only be reached via the outside lifts.
February 28th, 2010 | 
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