Heron Tower
Heron Tower pictured from Wormwood Street in 2012
General information
Status	Complete
Type	Commercial
Location	110, Bishopsgate London, United Kingdom
Construction started	2007
Completed	2011
Height
Antenna spire	230 metres (755 ft)[1]
Roof	202 metres (663 ft)[2]
Technical details
Other dimensions	2,400-square-metre (26,000 sq ft) site
Floor count	46 [3]
Floor area	461,478 sq ft (43,000 m2)[4]
Design and construction
Main contractor	Skanska
Architect	Kohn Pedersen Fox
Structural engineer	Ove Arup & Partners

The lobby features a 70,000-litre aquarium containing over 1,200 fish.

Heron Tower, located at and also referred to as 110 Bishopsgate, is a skyscraper owned by Heron International in London, United Kingdom.^[5] It was completed in 2011.

Heron Tower stands 230 m tall^[6] including its 28 m mast, or 202 m excluding the mast - making it the tallest building in the City of London and the third tallest in Greater London, after One Canada Square and Shard London Bridge.

Design and planning[link]

Designed by architects Kohn Pedersen Fox, the height of Heron Tower was planned to be 183 m, identical to that of the City of London's then tallest building, Tower 42.

The skyscraper attracted some controversy when first announced due to its proximity to St Paul's Cathedral when viewed from Waterloo Bridge. English Heritage was notably vocal in expressing concerns. A public inquiry was subsequently held, the outcome of which was decided by deputy prime minister John Prescott, who ruled in the developers' favour. The tower was given final approval for construction in July 2002.

Three years later, the project had yet to begin construction. In September 2005 the Heron Property Corporation submitted a planning application to increase the height of its approved building. Heron's revised plans now proposed a 202-metre (663 ft) tall tower topped by a 28-metre (92 ft) mast, giving it a 230-metre (755 ft) total height. Although the design was largely identical to the previous scheme, the tower's crown and southern façades were refined. In January 2006, the revised project was approved by the City of London Corporation.

Interior[link]

Heron Tower was designed to feature a concierge-style entrance and reception area, incorporating a 70,000-litre aquarium with 1,200 fish.^[7] The aquarium is the largest privately-owned in the United Kingdom and contains over 60 different species of fish in an entire sustainable ecosystem; the species were selected by expert biologists and animal curators to ensure compatibility and adaptability to the aquarium environment. The tank is attended to by a dedicated team of two full-time fish attendants, who feed the fish a diet rich in natural ingredients according to their requirements and monitor the tank for water chemistry and fish health, and two to three part-time divers who clean the rockwork and windows twice a week.

The Drift Bar occupies part of the ground and first floors.^[8] There will be a restaurant and "sky bar" - both open to the public - on floors 38-40.^[9] Situated 175 m above the City and accessed by scenic lifts from a dedicated entrance on Bishopsgate, the restaurant and bar will have external terraces.^[10]

Environment[link]

Heron Tower utilises photovoltaic cells to generate renewable energy, allowing it to achieve a BREEAM rating of 'excellent' in January 2010.^[11]

Construction[link]

In March 2007, it was confirmed that Heron had signed a funding deal with the State General Reserve Fund of the Sultanate of Oman to provide the equity for the development.^[12] Following the appointment of Skanska, the firm that erected the gherkin-shaped 30 St Mary Axe, as main contractor, work began on the site in mid-2007.

Full construction began in April 2008, with foundation piles and steel rebar cages being installed, while the first tower crane was erected in June. In August a second tower crane was erected, followed by a third and final crane in September. In early October, the first steel beams appeared on site, with the core visible above street level.^[13] In November, steelwork temporarily finished, and concrete was poured for the base slabs. Pouring of concrete continued until Christmas.

Steelwork recommenced on 19 January 2009. The speed of construction then increased, with floors being constructed in sets of two, with each set taking a planned fortnight to construct.^[14] The first cladding was applied on 22 May.

In July, Heron International, Skanska and Kohn Pedersen Fox held a Time Capsule Ceremony at the site, marking the sealing of the building's foundations. The time capsule contained a number of items of significance to Heron Tower and also included an ethically sourced tortoise shell, in line with Feng Shui principles.^[15] In October 2009 the tower was at 34 floors standing at just over 150 metres, meaning it was defined as a skyscraper. In mid-October, construction reached the tower's first 'setback' - the '3 storey village' construction over, and the last 50 metres of the building to be constructed, forming the top of the tower, followed by the spire to top out the building. In early November 2009 it overtook the 164m Broadgate Tower, making it the third tallest building in the City. By the end of 2009, construction reached the 44th floor, overtaking Tower 42 as the tallest building in the City of London, a record it had held for 30 years. Christmas lights were also added to the cranes in December.

On 12 April 2010, Heron International held a 'topping out' ceremony to celebrate the building's structural completion, attended by the Lord Mayor of London.^[16] On 22 July 2010, the spire was added, taking the height of the building to 230 metres.^[17] In January 2011, the Aquarium was delivered and installed. The building is now officially open and in use.

Construction gallery[link]

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  May 2008

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  October 2009

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  January 2010

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  December 2010

Heron Plaza[link]

Heron Tower will form the centrepiece of Heron International's Heron Plaza development on the 110 Bishopsgate site, incorporating new public spaces and a network of squares and gardens. In July 2009, Heron International confirmed that it had signed heads of terms with Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts to develop a mixed-use project as a component of Heron Plaza.^[18] In January 2011, Heron announced that planning permission for the development had been secured.^[19]

See also[link]

• City of London landmarks
• Tower 42
• 30 St Mary Axe
• Broadgate Tower
• Bishopsgate Tower
• Shard London Bridge

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Heron Tower

• Official Heron Tower website
• Project page of Skanska

Gerald Maurice Ronson CBE (born 27 May, 1939)^[3] is a British business tycoon and philanthropist.

Career[link]

Aged 15, Ronson left school and joined his father in the family furniture business, named Heron after his father Henry. The company expanded into property (American usage real estate) development, at first with small residential projects, later with commercial and office properties too. By 1967 the company was active in seven European countries and fifty-two British municipalities. In the mid-1960s Ronson brought the first self-service petrol retail outlets to the United Kingdom. Ronson once controlled almost a thousand of them, through a separate entity called Snax 24.

By the early 1980s Heron was one of the largest private companies in the United Kingdom, with assets of over £1.5 billion, but the company was over-extended and by the 1990s had almost collapsed with debts of £2.4 billion owed to 89 banks and 15,000 bondholders. The company survived with help from Bill Gates, Rupert Murdoch, Craig McCaw, Oracle Corporation’s founder, Larry Ellison, and others who gave loans to Heron.^[4]

In addition to Heron International and Snax 24, Ronson's more recent additional business ventures include Ronson Capital Partners, an investment firm he established to invest opportunistically in real estate assets in the UK;^[5] and Rontec Investments, a consortium comprising Snax 24, Investec and Grovepoint Capital, created to acquire the assets of Total Oil UK.^[6]

Guiness Four[link]

Ronson became known in the UK as one of the "Guinness Four" for his involvement in the Guinness share-trading fraud of the 1980s, along with Ernest Saunders and occasional business associates Jack Lyons and Anthony Parnes. He was convicted in August 1990 of one charge of conspiracy, two of false accounting, and one of theft, and was fined £5 million and given a one-year jail sentence, of which he served six months. In 2000 the European Court of Human Rights ruled that the 1990 trial had been unfair because there had been an improper collusion between the DTI inspectors and the prosecuting authorities.^[7] A further appeal to the Court of Appeal Criminal Division, that sought to have the Human Rights Act 1998 applied retrospectively, and claimed that the trial jury had been "nobbled", failed in 2001.^[8] A final appeal to the House of Lords (now the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom) failed in 2002.^[9]

Philanthropy[link]

Gerald Ronson is a recognised philanthropist and his current positions include Founding Chairman of the Community Security Trust,^[10] Vice President of the NSPCC^[11] and President of JCoSS.^[12]

Ronson has won a number of business and property awards, including, most recently, City AM’s Personality of the Year Award in September 2011.^[13] In 2009, His Majesty King Juan Carlos bestowed Gerald Ronson with the Encomienda de Numero of the Spanish Order of Civil Merit Decoration.^[14] In the same year, he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Civil Law from Northumbria University.^[15]

Ronson was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2012 New Year Honours for charitable services.^[16]

Personal life[link]

Ronson is married to philanthropist and socialite Dame Gail Ronson. They have four daughters: Lisa, Amanda, Nicole and Hayley.^[17] He is the uncle of producer Mark Ronson.^[18]

Autobiography[link]

• Leading From The Front: My Story by Gerald Ronson with Jeffrey Robinson.

References[link]

External links[link]

• New Years Honours List 2012, BBC News, 31 December 2011.
• "Guinness Four fail in fight for acquittal", BBC News, 21 December 2001.
• "Life and high-flying times of four partners in crime", The Scotsman, 22 December 2001.
• Gerald Ronson profile in the UK business magazine Leisure Management
• "A Guy Named Gerald," interview with Gerald Ronson, Building.co.uk, 2007.