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Heron Tower and Shard to be among the last of iconic buildings as austerity drive ushers in the era of ‘ground-scrapers’ The architect of the Gherkin has declared that the “age of bling” is over in the City, pronouncing the end of the London skyscraper boom. The recently-finished Heron Tower, along with the Shard, the Cheesegrater and the Walkie Talkie, which are still under construction and are due to open by 2014, will be the last generation of iconic skyscrapers, he says, as property developers turn to more modest, less expensive schemes. The towers were all conceived before the financial crisis and some of them were nearly scrapped during the property downturn. “The age of bling is over,” Ken Shuttleworth, the architect at Norman Foster’s firm which designed the Gherkin, told Bloomberg News . He said the 40-storey tower, which opened in 2004, would never get off the ground today. “Money now drives everything, so if you can build something for half the price, you will.” Tenants are demanding “austere and efficient” buildings that are more likely to be “ground-scrapers” than high-rises, he said. “The tall glass box is dead.” Tall buildings cost more to build than low-rise structures with the same amount of space. At the same time, many tenants are reluctant to pay a premium for being in a tower as belt-tightening continues. Property tycoon Gerald Ronson recently admitted it will take about 18 months to let all space in his Heron Tower, with the lower floors going for about £55 a sq ft while the top floors will command more. Rents in the City today are around the same level as in the 1980s. Nonetheless, demand for office space in the City is on the rise again. Assuming that banks and other financial firms will be taking on 11,500 new staff over the next three years as the economy recovers, BNP Paribas Real Estate estimates that they will need an additional 1.6m sq ft of space – equivalent to four Shards or five Heron Towers. Its research shows that typical take up in the City is 3.1m sq ft every year, and the banks’ expansion will mean extra requirements of about 550,000 sq ft a year up to 2014. Two of the biggest new office buildings, the Cheesegrater and the Walkie Talkie, will not be completed until 2014. Dan Bayley, head of central London at BNP Paribas Real Estate, said: “The general trend seems to be that the smaller – perhaps more nimble – occupiers expect to see the strongest growth; the really big banks are only expecting very modest growth. This suggests that the trend we have seen in the first quarter – more deals but fewer really big ones – is likely to continue.” According to DTZ Research, free space in the City amounted to 7.2m sq ft at the end of March. Availability has risen by 201,000 sq ft, nearly 3%, after December. Within this, the amount of secondhand space available is down by 8%, while new space grew by 14%. Construction industry Financial sector Architecture London Financial crisis Banking Julia Kollewe guardian.co.uk