Following an architectural competition, Dixon Jones (National Gallery, Royal Opera House, Said Business School) was appointed as the architect for the developers Parabola Land Limited. In delivering the brief, they have skilfully brought together a major arts venue and creative hub, elegantly situated bars and dining areas including a water front restaurant, an excellent conference and events centre, and a Grade A office complex. In addition to being an iconic, mixed-use building, Kings Place has been planned and designed from the very beginning as an environmentally sustainable development.
Kings Place was conceived with the surrounding area very much in mind. The northern facade of the building sits next to the Battlebridge Basin section of the Regents Canal and in close proximity to early industrial buildings to the east. The design has also taken into account the planned developments to the north and west. The design accommodates the difference in scale in the local landscape by breaking the building down into three basic components: a smaller-scale block on Battlebridge basin and the rotunda on the north-east corner are connected to a long rectangular block facing York Way. Between these components, running west to east, is a street-like atrium.