London Stations in Postcards – Kings Cross

Kings Cross Station is the London terminus of the East Coast Main Line serving Yorkshire, the Northeast and Scotland. It was built by the Great Northern Railway to a design by Lewis Cubitt and opened in 1852. Notable for the simplicity of its brick-built façade with two grand arches corresponding to the two great train sheds that covered the platforms and a clock tower. It was the most restrained frontage of any London termini and owed very little to the Gothic, Classical or Baroque traditions that prevailed elsewhere. The façade was hidden in post-war years by an accretion of undistinguished commercial premises and later by a purpose built ticket sales building. It was 2014 before these additions were removed and the station regained its former glory. In the Thatcher era the station and its environs acquired an unenviable reputation for drug dealing, prostitution and homelessness. This was addressed in the early 2000s since when commercial and residential development of redundant railway land to the north of the station has gentrified the area. In 2012 a new departures concourse opened – designed by John McAslan with a steel roof engineered by Arup, complete with spectacular lighting scheme.