Jubilee Place: Borough Market, London

We worked with the Trustees of Borough Market from 2006 as ‘estate architects’ providing a wide range of projects to support the financial sustainability of the market and to assist it in fulfilling its charter of providing affordable food for local people. These projects were key to allowing the Market to deliver strategic elements of their estate’s strategy.

We developed the brief closely with Borough Market and initially created a new multi-functional entrance space that can be utilised as an auditorium, an exhibition and education space and on a day to day basis a place for visitors to meet friends, rest and enjoy the fruits of the Market.

This innovative project transforms this pocket of Southwark into a revolutionary new city garden, creating a space which is simultaneously a meeting place, community space, classroom, kitchen, dining room and garden. The main space includes a bespoke oval lighting feature as well as integrated vertical planting structures where food is grown as part of the integrated food experience, representing the life cycle of plants grown, harvested, prepared and eaten, promoting food education and feeding many of the markets public workshops and demonstrations to the public and local community.

We also developed a stepped auditorium clad in Iroko timber,  building upon the material palette used in the Market Hall project, with recycled floorboards lining the inside face of the Podium structure. This provides an essential storage facility for market traders, hidden discretely beneath the rake of the auditorium seating. The detail design decoration references the Victorian timber cladding of the original market canopies as well as green corrugated metal used throughout the market. From the top of the Podium views can be gained of Southwark Cathedral and the Shard creating a sense of place and grounding within the market location.

The location of the Podium within Jubilee Place allows wholesale traders to operate undisturbed and the folding doors which align flush to the exterior provide security to the Podium when the market is not in use.

The new internal space is populated with mobile structures and seating that can be organized into different configurations to suit a variety of events – whether it is teaching, relaxing or another purpose – all designed by DLA. We also designed a number of versatile ‘pop-up’ type structures with flexibility in mind to allow for their use at a variety of functions, including a structure which is used as a demonstration kitchen.

Carrying out the work in Borough Market provided challenges with restricted site access and the need to allow a ‘quiet time’ for two and a half hours every day. There were additional security and public safety issues due to the busy local context and the overhead railway viaduct.

We were appointed in 2018 to develop designs for a series of new fixed and temporary market food stalls. This required the demolition and replacement of existing market stalls, customers seating and back of house area. We looked to optimise the space available within the existing structure and reflect the surrounding Market Hall aesthetic.

This created an opportunity for traders to tap into the tourist market who were looking to eat at the stall rather than buy food to take home with them – with stalls having fixed bar stools as well as trading areas. We listened to the comments made by traders who felt that they had become part of ‘the attraction’ and that it was too packed with tourists for everyday shoppers to buy food. This project sought to overcome this resulting in increased revenue for traders from both tourists and everyday shoppers.