The Gherkin

The Gherkin exists because of a bomb. On 10 April 1992, the IRA detonated a one-tonne fertiliser bomb in a van parked on St Mary Axe in the City of London. The explosion killed three people, injured 91, and gutted the Baltic Exchange, a Victorian trading hall that had been the global headquarters for the shipping freight market since 1903. The damage was catastrophic enough that the Baltic Exchange building was declared beyond repair and demolished.

On the cleared site, Foster + Partners won a commission to build something new. Their initial proposal was the Millennium Tower, a 92-storey building that would have been the tallest in Europe. Heathrow and London City Airports objected. Flight paths mattered. The design was scaled back to 41 floors, 180 metres, and the result was 30 St Mary Axe, completed in 2003 and opened in April 2004. Within weeks, Londoners had renamed it the Gherkin, and the name stuck in a way that Norman Foster probably had mixed feelings about.

What Makes It Worth Visiting

The Gherkin is not open to the general public as a viewing tower. It is a working office building occupied by insurance and financial companies. But there are two legitimate ways to get inside.

The first is Searcys at the Gherkin, the restaurant and bar that occupies floors 38 through 40. Searcys is a genuine destination: the views from the top three floors are panoramic, the 360-degree glass wrapping means there’s no bad seat, and the contemporary British menu changes seasonally. Dinner is the better experience; the city lights after dark from that height are genuinely impressive. The Iris Bar on floor 40 is the place to go if you want a drink without committing to a full meal, though booking is still essential. Searcys operates Monday through Friday (it’s a business district and the lunch crowd is corporate); don’t turn up on a Saturday expecting to walk in.

The second route in is a private event booking, which is outside most visitors’ budgets and purposes but worth knowing about.

For everyone else: the exterior is freely accessible. The building photographs best from the small public plaza on the south side, which gives you the full tapering cylinder from street level. Walk around it. The diagrid structure, those crisscrossing diagonal steel beams visible through the glass, is part of what makes it aerodynamically efficient and visually distinctive. The building is designed so wind flows around rather than buffeting the structure, which also means the plaza at ground level is less exposed than the typical windy gap between City towers.

The Architecture in Brief

Foster’s design solved several problems at once. The bullet shape reduces wind load. The triangular floor plates, rotated slightly with each floor, create six spiral shafts running the full height of the building that act as a passive ventilation system, reducing air conditioning load by around 50% compared with a conventional glass tower. The glass panels, each triangular except for the flat circular ones at the top, use three different glass types depending on their position on the facade. The building won the Stirling Prize in 2004, which is the architecture equivalent of a Booker.

One thing few people notice: the dome at the very top, known as the Lens, is a direct reference to the glass dome that covered the original Baltic Exchange trading floor. Parts of that original dome are now in the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich. The Gherkin is, in a sense, a memorial to what the bomb destroyed, built in the shape of a lens looking upward.

The Surrounding Area

The City of London in this block contains several other architecturally notable buildings worth a short detour.

Sky Garden at 20 Fenchurch Street (the “Walkie Talkie” building) has a free public garden at the top with arguably the best free 360-degree view in London. You must book in advance on the Sky Garden website, but there’s no entry charge. The views of the Gherkin from up here are particularly good and give you a sense of scale that’s impossible from street level.

The Leadenhall Building (“Cheesegrater”) is visible from the Gherkin plaza, a diagonal wedge designed by Rogers Stirk Harbour. The public arcade at its base houses a bar and a few restaurants. The building itself is also not open to visitors but the surrounding streets are architectural education for free.

Lloyd’s of London is one minute’s walk north on Lime Street: Richard Rogers’s 1986 inside-out masterpiece with its services (pipes, lifts, ductwork) on the exterior. The trading room inside was the largest in the world when it opened. Not publicly accessible, but the exterior is extraordinary and the building’s function, as the market where complex and unusual risks are insured, is fascinating in its own right.

Leadenhall Market, a covered Victorian market on Gracechurch Street, is the most accessible respite from financial district glass and steel. The ornate glass-roofed arcade houses pubs, restaurants, and specialty food shops. It appeared as Diagon Alley in early Harry Potter films if that’s useful trivia. Good for a coffee or lunch without fighting for a table.

Where to Eat

The City of London functions Monday through Friday and largely shuts on weekends. Plan accordingly.

Searcys at the Gherkin is the obvious choice if you’re making a dedicated visit and have the budget. Prices put it in the London fine dining bracket: expect £50 to £80 per person for dinner without wine. Lunch is more accessible. Book weeks ahead for evening slots.

Hawksmoor Guildhall on Basinghall Street is in my view the best steak restaurant in the City: dry-aged British beef, honest cooking, serious cocktails. More straightforward and excellent for a longer lunch. Budget £60 to £90 per person with wine.

Boisdale of Bishopsgate on Swedeland Court is the kind of place that makes you understand why people enjoy working in the City: Scottish seafood, excellent whisky, live jazz some evenings, deeply clubbable atmosphere. Not cheap but not as expensive as you’d expect.

For something quicker: Duck & Waffle, on the 40th floor of Heron Tower on Bishopsgate, serves 24 hours a day (one of very few London restaurants to do so) and has exceptional views. The signature duck and waffle dish is better than it sounds.

Where to Stay

The City itself has limited hotel options, and most are priced for expense-account travellers. For most visitors, Shoreditch (5 minutes walk east) or Tower Hill (10 minutes walk) are better bases with more character and lower rates.

Hoxton Shoreditch is about a 15-minute walk and represents good value: hip without trying too hard, reliable rooms, and the neighbourhood has genuinely good restaurants and bars. Rates from £150 to £200 per night.

Montcalm Royal London House, on Finsbury Square a short walk north, is a well-run City hotel if you want proximity. Rates around £200 to £280 depending on season.

CitizenM Tower of London, 10 minutes south on the river, is worth knowing: small rooms designed intelligently, reasonable rates (£120 to £180), and a rooftop bar with Tower Bridge views that beats most more expensive hotels.

Getting There

Liverpool Street is the closest mainline station, around a six-minute walk west on Bishopsgate. Aldgate is the closest tube station (Circle and Hammersmith & City lines), three minutes walk east. Bank station (Central, Northern, Waterloo & City lines) is ten minutes south. The City is well served by surface trains from the southeast as well.

There is no practical reason to arrive by car. No parking exists within a reasonable distance and the Congestion Charge applies Monday through Friday.

The Gherkin’s address is 30 St Mary Axe, EC3A 8EP. Walk out of Liverpool Street’s south exit onto Bishopsgate, turn left at Camomile Street, and the building appears in front of you within three minutes. You won’t need to look at your phone.