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Project: Old Street London’s Tech City.
Architect: Architecture 00:/

The Government has announced that it will give the Architecture 00:/’s proposal for a new technical and creative institute at Old Street’s “Silicon Roundabout” £50m funding.

David Cameron announced the invesment at the LSE’s Electric City conference in Shoreditch last week, saying it would foster the next generation of digital entrepreneurs.

The proposals include a new civic space owned and operated in the community interest providing workshop and exhibition spaces, free workspaces, education and innovation accelerators. It will also feature public realm improvements to the Tech City area, including proposals to create a pedestrian peninsular, and safer cycle routes.

Alastair Parvin of Architecture 00:/, said: “The proposition aims to follow in the footsteps of London’s great civic institutions, such as the British Library, the Royal Institution, the Tate: building a national commons for young inventors and creatives, which is accessible to all of us.”

Cameron added: “The UK is in a global race and I am determined that we as a Government continue doing everything we can to equip the UK to compete and thrive in that race. That’s why we’re investing in creating the largest civic space in Europe – a place for start-up companies and the local community to come together and become the next generation of entrepreneurs.”

But not everybody is pleased with the announcement, Richard Sennett of the London School Of Economics has dismissed Architecture 00’s plans. He said: “When the prime minister and mayor announced there will now be a dedicated space for creativity I thought, ‘This area is now over’ The idea of building a place where we put all the tech people contravenes why that area grew up in the first place. The reason the area is a centre for innovation already is that most of the firms that are here weren’t meant to be here. It was somewhere planners never expected them to go,” he told the Urban Age: Electric City conference which was held yards from the Old Street roundabout last week.