Hoxton Hotel - Waterloo, London

The hotel incorporates a Grade II former fire station, opposite the Old Vic Theatre in London’s Waterloo, and a newbuild extension. EPR’s scheme re-establishes a coherent corner on Waterloo Road blighted by insensitive post-war office development. The challenge has been to design a new building which is sensitive to its context, and respectful to the scale of the Old Fire Station.

 In addition, Lambeth planners required “the retention of Pear Place as a memory of a former historic street,” which has effectively divided the hotel into two parts. This has necessitated the hotel being linked by glass bridges across Pear Place at upper levels. The Old Fire Station remains substantially unaltered at ground floor level, where bar / restaurant uses have been retained, with the upper floors converted to bedrooms. The newbuild part of the hotel incorporates the majority of the bedrooms with meeting rooms on the top floor to take advantage of the views across to the city. At ground level is the new hotel entrance with a corner retail unit that ensures continuity of retail frontages linking Waterloo Road to the Lower Marsh shopping area. Pear Place, currently gated, will be re-landscaped and opened up for public use.