Zaha Hadid Architects' plans for two soaring skyscrapers at Vauxhall Cross could be the firm's first foray into a mixed-use project in London, but the design is proving controversial.
The architecture firm submitted plans for the two towers, measuring 185 and 151 metres respectively, at the end of 2017.
The architects claim the scheme could bring 2,000 jobs and 260 new homes to the area, but critics are opposed to the height of the towers and the plans to demolish the existing public bus station to make way for private development.

Connected by a ten-storey podium, the development would include offices, retail space, a hotel and apartments. Until now Zaha Hadid Architects (ZHA) has only designed public buildings in London: the London Aquatics Centre and the Serpentine Sackler Gallery. Renders show the two rectilinear towers rising from the fluted podium, with soaring floor-to-ceiling glazing in between a grid of oblong arches and indents to accommodate for outdoor terraces.
The Vauxhall Cross Island area has been identified as a "key regeneration site" by Lambeth Council and the proposed podium footprint would occupy what is currently a patch of scrubland covered in billboards in the middle of the Vauxhall Gyratory.
Permission had previously been granted on appeal to Squire & Partners in 2012, when it re-submitted plans to build towers 41 and 31 storeys high. The local council had refused the original 46 and 23 storey scheme.

However, the ZHA proposed towers...