Within days, Britain lost two masters of architecture

In September 2025, Nicholas Grimshaw and Terry Farrell – who died only days apart – left a void in contemporary architecture. Their names have marked the global discipline, beginning in England, where their stories started: Grimshaw became synonymous with high-tech, Farrell with postmodernism and urban transformation. But beyond these labels lies a deeper common root. Until 1980, Grimshaw and Farrell worked in partnership, part of the same milieu as Foster and Rogers, who were translating radical experiments such as Archigram and Cedric Price’s into a language destined to shape late 20th-century architecture.
Grimshaw would continue along that trajectory, authoring high-tech landmarks such as Waterloo Station in London, the Eden Project in Cornwall, and – as Grimshaw Architects – the Sustainability Pavilion for Expo 2020 in Dubai. Farrell, meanwhile, pushed the radical legacy toward irony and eclecticism, becoming associated with London postmodern icons like Charing Cross Station and the MI6 headquarters – featured in recent James Bond films – as well as major international works including Beijing South Railway Station and Shenzhen’s KK100 tower.

But in the 1970s, amid the aestheticization of technology, Grimshaw and Farrell together created a concise series of industrial buildings along the Thames: a Citroën warehouse, another industrial facility since demolished, and the Herman Miller factory in Bath. These projects pursued the sustainable logic of lightweight, modular steel construction while engaging in dialogue with the English landscape. Domus featured them across issues 543 (February 1975), 572 (July 1977), and 576 (November 1977).

The warehouse is a speculative venture on the part of MacKay Securities, on a rural site on the banks of the Thames overlooking the historic Runnymede Green, where King John signed the Magna Carta.

This site was previously occupied by a paint factory and when the land came up for sale, this factor probably acted as a precedent in deciding whether the land should be used for domestic, leisure or industrial purposes. The building is, in fact, surrounded by cottages and weekend retreats on either side and on the opposite bank, offering a marked contrast in size and scale to the warehouse. For these reasons, the architects had to be particularly delicate in their design of the building and had to satisfy a number of points laid down by the Royal Fine Art Commission.

In particular, the building was to have a fairly low overall height and has actually achieved an even lower apparent height, by virtue of landscaping, planting and a banked grass verge which runs alongside the building. Apart from this need for the building not to overpower the scale of the surrounding countryside and neighboring buildings, it had also to blend sympathetically with its surroundings. This consideration is reflected in the color scheme of olive green, plastic coated, troughed metal cladding (which even has plastic headed screws of the same color), bronze, acrylic coated window frames and two tones of solar resisting, brown tinted glass in the offices. Green spa chippings have been laid on the roof with respect to the view from neighboring high ground.

The warehouse is a single store unit containing a clear storage space of 47.011 m 3, with an area of approximately 7.710 m2 and first floor office area of 930 m2. There are also two residential units to the rear of the building, offering two-bedroom, lounge, kitchen and bathroom accommodation, plus extensive garage facilities with access to the drive and the Thames.

The architects were thus faced with the problem of having to provide the largest possible storage space on the site as cheaply as possible for their client and also to produce an elegant, unobtrusive building with consideration to the environment.

The solution adopted was that of a variable cross-section propped steel cantilever. This structure comprises a centre column with welded fillets and stiffeners at the top, supporting a long I section beam which is deeper in the middle section, with a span of approximately 33 m and a fall of 305 mm from the middle to either end where the “props” are bolted on.

The site was acquired in 1973 with existing outline consent for the conversion of an existing building to warehouse and offices and the construction of a new warehouse and office building on the adjacent vacant site.

The intention was to develop the site for office and residential use, and this was agreed in principle with the local authority, but in view of government restrictions on office development at the time, the original planning consent was adhered to. The brief, therefore, was to design a speculative prestige distribution centre within the constraints of an existing planning consent, retaining as far as possible the existing building which had previously been a bowling alley. The intention throughout was to produce a building of quality which would attract a “blue chip tenant”, and which would settle into its surroundings in the long term and create a net environmental gain.

Both existing and new buildings are clad entirely in olive green, plastic coated steel and bronze tinted double glazing with green GRP fascia and corner panels. All external surfaces were in the green/brown spectrum to enable the building to fit in with the colours of the river and landscaping generally. The new building has a steel frame structure with concrete ground slab and first floor stab.
The existing building was stripped down to the existing concrete frame and steel truss roof which were retained. The structure of the new building is designed to accommodate a future conversion to a two storey office building around a central courtyard. Service runs and drainage were designed to allow for the possibility of a future offices and housing development.

This building is an attempt to put new ideas in the industrial field into practice. The aim has been to produce an industrial unit which is not only capable of responding to the wide variety of demands by the client but also breaks new ground in terms of providing better amenities and greater involvement for the work people. The following quotation from the client's brief gives an idea of the importance that was attached by him to the concept of change: "In our planning we should know that ... our needs will change, the scale of operation will change, things about us will change, we will change."

The building is situated on the River Avon at Bath. Although it is in an industrial area, considerable importance was attached to the way in which the building fitted into its surroundings. 

The fibreglass panels are cream coloured to harmonize with the Bath Stone which is the predominant material in the City. Care has been paid to the landscaping - the whole site has been turfed and nine mature willow trees have been planted along the river bank. Fixed, external tables and seating have been provided for sixty work people on the south side of the building where two courtyards incorporating fürther "mobile" planting also open on to the river frontage.

The building is currently used for manufacturing a wide range of office furniture including Herman Miller's well known "Action Office" open plan system. A considerable proportion of the output from the building is exported to Europe and depending on expansion there the current balance of office/manufacturing/storage/amenity uses is likely to vary widely.

The structure of the building is a simple primary and secondary beam system with columns on a 10 x 20 m grid. Thus only two rows of 9 columns interrupt the total space which is 6 m high and nearly 6000 sqm in area. The height of the building enables it to be used very effectively for high volume palletised storage as well as maufacturing processes.

Energy conservation has been a prime consideration throughout the design process and the low wall/floor ratio of 1:30 (as opposed to the typical 1:50 or 1:75 for industrial buildings) combined with high roof insulation have been contributing factors in the low running costs.

Opening image: Domus 572, July 1977