Welbeck Street Car Park was constructed in 1970 and designed by Michael Blampied and Partners for Debenhams PLC to serve its flagship Oxford Street store. The building is constructed of tessellated concrete polygons and occupies an awkwardly shaped site contained by Henrietta Place and Marylebone Lane. Historic England took the decision not to add the structure to the register for Listed Buildings despite the building being repeatedly named as one of the unsung heroes in the capital. Soon after the site was sold to Shiva hotels in a reported £ 100 million deal and is now under threat of demolition. The land was originally valued at £30 million in 2014 but was soon identified as a site with a potential increase in land value by 300% in a 2016 report by Pastor Real EstateThe car park attracted the attention of the Architectural Press following its completion in 1971, given its aesthetic quality and structural ingenuity, which stood out in a sea of magnolia.
This project was originally driven by a desire to provide a response to the Historic England report, the commentary makes little reference to the larger context of the post-war infrastructure - driven entirely by the velocity of motor vehicle ownership in the 1960s. My aim was to demonstrate that the clear beauty of the structure had been overlooked, but what I discovered and eventually captured was the weight of the economic burden, lack of maintenance and extreme underuse. It was announced on the 10th of August 2016 that the application for its demolition had been approved by Westminster Council.
