One Museum Street

One Museum Street is a public realm-led masterplan which envisions a new mixed-use neighbourhood spanning several blocks between Covent Garden, Bloomsbury and the West End, situated minutes from Tottenham Court Road.

The scheme builds upon the London Borough of Camden’s vision for Holborn, bringing a new cohesive identity to the area’s diverse and fragmented streetscape. It aims to restore the original 18th-century pattern of streets to the west of Museum Street by creating new pedestrian connections between the British Museum and High Holborn, whilst introducing a lively mix of ground-floor uses to replace current blank frontages.

A new north-south route through the site provides an intimate and pedestrian scale that enables the larger elements of the scheme to sit sensitively in their context. Alongside providing a high-quality neighbourhood experience, generous green space on Museum Street acts to preserve existing mature trees and ties the buildings to the streetscape through the introduction of additional layered and intensified planting, all providing new public space in the heart of a once-neglected pocket of central London.

The masterplan comprises four individual schemes: One Museum Street, an elegant and highly articulated stepped tower with a cascade of greened terraces across its 19 storeys, each one designated with a different biodiverse planting strategy; High Holborn and Vine Lane, two newly built 6-storey residential buildings; and West Central Street, a part new build and part retrofitted early Victorian block, providing a mix of houses, including affordable homes.

The new buildings reference the architecture of the surrounding Bloomsbury Conservation Area and notable works by the two architects who made significant local contributions to the character of the neighbourhood: James Pennethorne and Charles Fitzroy Doll. In particular, the masterplan’s smaller blocks feature bays, cornice and pier detailing and materials reminiscent of the more exuberant buildings by Fitzroy Doll, who is well-known for designing eclectic and ornate hotels on the nearby Russell Square.