BBC Broadcasting House, Cardiff | |
---|---|
General information | |
Status | Demolished |
Address | Llantrisant Road, Llandaff |
Town or city | Cardiff |
Country | Wales |
Coordinates | 51°29′51.36″N3°13′38.28″W / 51.4976000°N 3.2273000°W |
Construction started | 1963 |
Opened | 1966 |
Inaugurated | 1 March 1967 |
Closed | 2020 |
Demolished | 2021–2022 |
Owner | BBC Cymru Wales |
Technical details | |
Floor count | 6 |
Design and construction | |
Architect(s) | Dale Owen |
Broadcasting House was the headquarters of BBC Cymru Wales' radio, television and online services, situated in north Cardiff. The purpose-built facility opened in 1966 and consisted of three blocks containing studios, offices and technical facilities. In 2020 the BBC moved out, transferring to New Broadcasting House in Central Square, Cardiff. The building was demolished between 2021 and 2022, with the site to be used for new housing.
The building housed the national broadcaster for Wales, providing a range of English and Welsh language content for audiences across Wales on television, radio and online. [1]
Broadcasting House was designed by Welsh architect Dale Owen (1924–97). [2] [3] Construction began in 1963. [4] The BBC moved into the building in 1966, which housed production and technical facilities, and was the principal base for BBC Cymru Wales. It was officially opened by Princess Margaret on St David's Day (1 March) 1967. [5]
The building was located in the Llandaff area of northern Cardiff, near the River Taff. It was close to Danescourt railway station and served by several Cardiff Bus services.
The BBC National Orchestra of Wales (BBC NOW) and the BBC National Chorus of Wales moved out of Studio 1 at Broadcasting House into a new facility, BBC Hoddinott Hall at the Wales Millennium Centre in 2009. Much of the BBC television drama studio facilities moved out in 2011 to a new facility in Roath Lock, Cardiff Bay.
In August 2013, it was announced that Broadcasting House and Ty Oldfield (Oldfield House), which is opposite Broadcasting House, was for sale, with plans to move to a new a purpose-built headquarters in Cardiff by 2018. The BBC has said that the "ageing infrastructure at Llandaff is clearly reaching the end of the road and it is time to look to the future". It was said that they considered three possible sites in Cardiff:
The Welsh Government's historic environment service Cadw advised that the building should be Grade II listed, but in 2014 John Griffiths, the Welsh Minister for Culture and Sport, overrode the advice and decided not to list the building. The decision was criticised by The Twentieth Century Society, which described it as one of Wales' most outstanding and important post war buildings. [7] [8] In 2014, it was confirmed that Broadcasting House and Ty Oldfield would be demolished and turned into 400 residential units. [5]
The BBC confirmed in 2015 that Central Square would be the location of their new headquarters building. [9] The BBC began to move out of the Llandaff studios during 2019. Wales Today were the last to make the move on 25 September 2020. [10] In September 2020, BBC Wales closed Broadcasting House and completed the move to Central Square.
The site was acquired by the development company Taylor Wimpey for a housing development, and Broadcasting House was demolished between November 2021 through to 2022. [11] [12] The site is now called Parc Llandaf, that will eventually include 377 homes with one and two bedroom apartments, plus three, four and five bedroom houses. [13]
The building was modernist in style, and aspects of Dale Owen's design reflected Walter Gropius's 1948 design of the Graduate Center at Harvard University in Massachusetts. Owen had studied at Harvard, and had spent a year working in Gropius's architectural practice, The Architects Collaborative. The design was also influenced by Mies van der Rohe's 1949 design of the Lake Shore Drive apartment buildings in Chicago. [14]
The building incorporated a long low-rise section housing the studios and a tower for the administration offices. The use of a concrete structural frame enabled large areas of glazing, and the main Llantrisant Road elevation was partially glazed. [14]
Television programmes produced at Broadcasting House Cardiff included BBC Wales Today , Newyddion , Doctor Who Confidential , The Chatterley Affair , Pobol y Cwm , Belonging , High Hopes , Satellite City and The District Nurse .[ citation needed ]
It was announced in March 2009 that the BBC would move the filming of shows such as Casualty and Crimewatch to the Roath Lock studios in Cardiff. [15]
Llandaff is a district, community and coterminous electoral ward in the north of Cardiff, capital of Wales. It was incorporated into the city in 1922. It is the seat of the Bishop of Llandaff, whose diocese within the Church in Wales covers the most populous area of Wales.
Pontcanna is an inner-city district and community in the west of Cardiff, Wales. It is located adjecent to Canton, Cardiff. It is also located a short distance to the city centre, and its borders are approximately indicated by Western Avenue, the River Taff, Cowbridge Road East and Llandaff Road.
BBC Cymru Wales is a division of the BBC and the main public broadcaster in Wales.
BBC Wales Today is the BBC's national television news programme for Wales, broadcast on BBC One Wales from the headquarters of BBC Cymru Wales in Central Square, Cardiff. According to the BBC, it is the world's longest-running television news programme.
ITV News Wales at Six is the evening news programme broadcast and produced by ITV Cymru Wales.
Television in Wales began in 1952. Initially, all programmes were in English with occasional Welsh language programmes. In 1982 Welsh language channel S4C was launched. The digital switchover happened in 2009-2010 and S4C became an exclusively Welsh language channel.
As the capital of Wales, media in Cardiff plays a large role in the city and nationwide. Employment in the sector has grown significantly in recent years, and currently provides employment for 2.1% of the city's workforce – higher than the level across Wales (1.1%) and marginally lower than that across Great Britain as a whole (2.2%).
Ffeil is a Welsh-language television news programme for children and young people, produced by BBC Cymru Wales for S4C.
Architecture in Cardiff, the capital city of Wales, dates from Norman times to the present day. Its urban fabric is largely Victorian and later, reflecting Cardiff's rise to prosperity as a major coal port in the 19th century. No single building style is associated with Cardiff, but the city centre retains several 19th and early 20th century shopping arcades.
Bus transport in Cardiff, the capital and most populous city in Wales, forms the major part of the city's public transport network, which also includes an urban rail network, Waterbus and international airport. Cardiff is a major city of the United Kingdom and a centre of employment, retail, business, government, culture, media, sport and higher education.
The Cardiff School of Journalism, Media and Culture (JOMEC) is Cardiff University's school for training in media. It is one of the journalism schools whose main universities are part of the Russell Group. It was founded as the Cardiff Journalism School in 1970 by Sir Tom Hopkinson and is the longest established postgraduate centre of journalism education in Europe. The school is considered to be one of the best training centres for journalists, and is described as the "Oxbridge of journalism".
BBC Roath Lock Studios is a television production studio that houses BBC drama productions including Doctor Who, Casualty, and Pobol y Cwm. The centre topped out on 20 February 2011 and filming for such productions commenced in autumn of the same year.
Porth Teigr is an area under development in the docks area of Cardiff Bay, in the south of Cardiff, Wales. Its development began in 2008.
Central Square is a large public space in Cardiff, Wales, adjacent to Cardiff Central railway station and included Cardiff Central bus station between 1954 and 2015. It was redeveloped and extended in the late 2010s and early 2020s.
Art in Cardiff refers to the culture of visual arts in Cardiff, capital city of Wales. The visual arts in Cardiff have a much more recent history than many British cities, due to it being a very small town until rapid growth took place in the mid nineteenth century. Cardiff School of Art originated in 1865 and the first major public art exhibition took place in 1870. The town became a city in 1905, after which time it gained further importance, for example with the creation of a new National Museum. Into the 21st century it has a thriving art scene.
BBC Cymru Wales New Broadcasting House, previously known as the BBC Cymru Wales headquarters building, is the headquarters of BBC Cymru Wales in Central Square, Cardiff. It operates many of its broadcasting services from there using IP-based studios. It also serves as a base for S4C.
This is a timeline of the history of television in Wales. It does not include events that affect the whole UK.
Cardiff Bus Interchange is a new bus and transport interchange, as well as offices and apartments, in the centre of Cardiff, the capital city of Wales. It has been under construction since 2020 and is due for completion in Spring 2024. Once completed it will be run by the Welsh Government's transport arm, Transport for Wales. The bus station at the southern end of the complex is eight storeys high with 14-bays for buses on the ground floor, whilst the Interchange Tower at the northern end has 318 for-rent apartments, two floors of office space, and a retail unit on the ground floor.
Ivan Dale Owen was a Welsh architect in the modernist architectural style. The Glamorgan Archives and The Independent newspaper both described him as a 'leading figure in Welsh architecture'. He was a partner in the Percy Thomas Partnership before setting up his own architectural practice with his wife in Penarth in 1989. Among Owen's designs were BBC Broadcasting House, Cardiff, the entrance building and galleries of St Fagans National Museum of History, Cardiff, plus major developments at Cardiff University, Swansea University and Aberystwyth University.