Autumn 1982: Late Lasdun in Luxembourg

The IBM men who used to trudge up to their office via a car park ramp under a plastic canopy might not want to hear this, but Denys Lasdun’s 76 Southbank (page 18) has a sister building – and it’s got a swimming pool.

The European Investment Bank in Luxembourg was completed in 1980, three years before the IBM Building, and shares many of the hallmarks: a staggered, horizontal form; deep terraces overhanging full-height glazing; precast concrete panels with exposed granite aggregate. Will Lee, director of Allford Hall Monaghan Morris, which led the IBM redevelopment, describes it as “almost the same building but in a different configuration”.

There was, however, one crucial difference: money. While Lasdun was left fuming at cost-cutting on the South Bank, the Luxembourger bankers were happy to splash out on a rooftop meeting room submerged in its own water garden, an immaculately white-tiled pool and the finest of concrete finishes. CQ felt that the decision had paid off with interest: “This is not so much a building to be admired from a distance as one to be scrutinised through a magnifying glass – something exceptional by today’s standards.

If you were sure that you never liked concrete surface finishes, then you are recommended to take a look at the faces of this building, which will make you have second thoughts. As an example of high-class bespoke concrete tailoring, you will be lucky to find a suit of more stylish elegance, cut on simple – if severe – classical lines.”

The high quality was an appropriately pan-European effort. “The panels were cast with Montefamo granite,
20-30mm in size, from Mergozzo in Italy, and with 80 per cent white cement and 20 per cent normal grey cement. The surface was deep-washed to expose the aggregate – a specialised technique developed in Britain. The panels were made under carefully controlled conditions in Metz, France. The result is an evenly textured silver-grey concrete which forms a splendid backcloth inside the building.”

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