Apple is planning to consolidate its various London offices into a single campus, come 2021.
The Evening Standard broke the news today that Apple’s future home in the U.K. capital will be inside the Battersea Power Station redevelopment zone — a site that has played host to many a press launch in recent years, given the spectacular backdrop of the Grade II listed power station decaying with grandeur in the middle of a prime riverside location.
The brick built, cathedral-esque Art Deco electricity station also featured on the cover of the 1977 Pink Floyd album, Animals — with a pig floating between two of its iconic chimneys. In five years’ time it will presumably have an Apple flag flying in a similar spot.
In a statement on its planned move, Apple told TechCrunch: “We are looking forward to opening Apple’s new London campus at The Battersea Power Station in 2021. 1,400 Apple employees from existing offices around London will relocate to this magnificent new development at one of London’s best known landmarks. It’s a great opportunity to have our entire team working and collaborating in one location while supporting the renovation of a neighbourhood rich with history.”
The company currently has offices in various locations around London, including near its Regent Street Apple Store in central London, and above its Covent Garden store. According to the Standard, eight Apple sites in all will be consolidated into a single campus in the Battersea Power Station development.
Apple will rent the top six floors in the former boiler house inside the power station building itself, with the office space structured around a large, central atrium — becoming the largest office tenant at the site, occupying some 500,000 sqft (or 40 per cent of the total office space in the development).
Apple’s forthcoming London campus will still be dwarfed in size by its European headquarters in Cork, Ireland — where the company’s site accommodates 6,000 staff. Meanwhile, work continues to complete Apple’s new UFO-style US HQ — which is being specced to fit 13,000 within 2.8M sqft.
The coal-power generating Battersea Power Station was decommissioned in 1983. There have been multiple attempts to redevelop the site ever since — the latest, a £9BN regeneration project backed by a consortium of Malaysian investors — has been ongoing since 2012, with the overseas investors getting planning permissions for a mixed use development, including luxury flats, offices and retail units. A new metro station is also being built to service the site.
In addition, 581 affordable housing units have been promised to be delivered as part of the project, although last year it was announced these would be moved away from the main site. The small proportion of affordable flats in the development has also attracted criticism.