Site values
THE WRAPS have come off two contribu- tions to the City's townscape, on two sites that deserve nothing but the best. Opposite the Mansion House Lord Palumbo has planted his cherished design, by James Sterling, nicknamed the Wireless Set. It is not obviously more useful or more hand- some than the elegant Victorian building it replaced, and we must hope that the roof keeps the rain out — not all of Sterling's roofs do — but it is at least the work of a human mind. Opposite St Paul's, some Japanese companies are putting up an office block which might have been the work of an uninspired computer. On this site stood the home of Slater Walker: no loss, even to history. It collapsed, or was demolished, and a splendid prospect opened: a piazza leading south from St Paul's towards the river. Now this obstruc- tion has closed it again, with the blessing of the Corporation of London, which fought Lord Palumbo to the end. I remind the City fathers that when they asked the Prince of Wales to dinner at the Mansion House, he passed judgment on the City's post-war buildings: 'Say what you like about the Luftwaffe, they only knocked it down.'
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