Battersea power station set for public opening after 10-year development

theguardian.com:

A pair of peregrine falcons are nesting in one of the distinctive white chimneys rising from the vast edifice of the revamped Battersea power station, unperturbed by the construction work.

Ten years and several prime ministers after developers first broke ground at a ceremony attended by David Cameron, Europe’s biggest brick building is set to open to the public on 14 October, with 254 apartments, as well as restaurants, bars, offices and a glass elevator that takes passengers to an eyrie on top of the north-west chimney.

Immortalised on a Pink Floyd album cover that featured flying pigs, and on screen in The King’s Speech and Ian McKellen’s Richard III, the building is an enduring feature of the Thames skyline but until now its interior has been off limits to most visitors.

A free “festival of power” will celebrate its latest incarnation, bringing to an end a long period of speculation during which developers variously proposed turning the derelict site into a giant theme park or a stadium for Chelsea football club.

For half a century, the power station burnt coal to generate as much as a fifth of London’s electricity, keeping the lights on in Buckingham Palace (codenamed Carnaby Street 2 in the control room) and the Houses of Parliament, before puffing its last plumes of smoke in 1983.

Now it is the centrepiece of a 42-acre site, nestled beside apartment blocks designed by the US architect Frank Gehry in his distinctive style with fragmented forms, and one large, bendy structure designed by Foster + Partners.

The project is owned by a consortium of Malaysian investorsled by SP Setia and Sime Darby Property, which bought the site in 2012 for £400m after its owner had gone into receivership. They embarked on a £9bn revamp,