You can see my house from here.

February 1, 2013 2:01 AM

The view from the top of The Shard. Courtesy of The Guardian.

For the Google-averse, The Shard is a very tall building built atop London Bridge station, that looks a bit like Sauron's tower in The Lord of the Rings movies. You can see it from everywhere in London, so consequently you can see everywhere in London from it. A bit slow to load, but impressive when it does.

posted by Grangousier (44 comments total)

That's great, and I enjoy a good panoramic, but they have totally mis-labelled Blackfriars Bridge as London Bridge, which is a fairly schoolboy error considering the Shard is actually right next to London Bridge, not a mile down the river from it.

Also, I am annoyed at an aerial panoramic like this that doesn't let you pan down to look at the ground.

Snark aside though, good effort.
posted by LondonYank at 3:37 AM on February 1, 2013

I'd rather like to go, but for two adults it'll be £50. For comparison - and I know it's not as tall, but it's an iconic, tourist-magnet building - the Eiffel Tower was 13EUR each.

I can see both it and the Gherkin from our work balcony. If St Paul's looks like a giant breast and the Gherkin is somewhat 'phallic', I wonder what architecture pervs will end up designating the Shard.
posted by mippy at 4:07 AM on February 1, 2013

They also don't know the difference between optimised for desktop and totally dependant on flash. It reports as the former for me, but actually means the latter.
posted by davemee at 4:08 AM on February 1, 2013

My partner was working at a party thrown at the top of the Shard, for the birthday of the guy whose idea it was to build it. It was, predictably, somewhat lavish.

He said that he overheard someone looking through one of the viewfinders and saying, without a trace of irony, "that's where the poor people live".
posted by greenish at 4:09 AM on February 1, 2013 [7 favorites]

I hear you can almost see (the rest of) Qatar on a clear day.
posted by pipeski at 4:13 AM on February 1, 2013 [5 favorites]

Wow, for such a large city, London is really flat. I think I can almost see my house from here! I can definitely see a couple of local landmarks.
posted by lucidium at 4:18 AM on February 1, 2013

You can see everyone's house from there.

without a trace of irony, "that's where the poor people live".

I can imagine poor going up there and saying "that's where the rich people live" or words to that effect. I was thinking "that's where all the rich fucking finance bastards work" when I looked at the towers.
posted by pracowity at 4:20 AM on February 1, 2013 [3 favorites]

I'm going up the Shard in a few weeks' time. I've always looked down on my fellow Londoners but it's nice, you know, to make it official.
posted by MuffinMan at 4:20 AM on February 1, 2013 [1 favorite]

Wow, for such a large city, London is really flat.

Thames flood plain. See the barriers.
posted by jaduncan at 4:29 AM on February 1, 2013 [2 favorites]

I saw an amusing Twitter exchange this morning, involving a gentleman bragging about how he was going to "take [his] girlfriend up The Shard later on". To which some wit replied, "make sure you use plenty of lube, mate".
posted by fight or flight at 4:32 AM on February 1, 2013 [6 favorites]

I'd rather like to go, but for two adults it'll be £50.

It costs £50 for two people to ride an elevator to the top of a building and have a look? That's a large grocery trip for our family. I'll just look at the pictures, thanks.
posted by pracowity at 4:40 AM on February 1, 2013 [2 favorites]

I was up there this morning. This guy proposed to his girlfriend... in front of a crowd of photographers...

So you'll probably see them in the papers tomorrow (and the Evening Standard tonight).
posted by MykReeve at 5:06 AM on February 1, 2013 [2 favorites]

I like how south London dissolves into a haze and there are almost no landmarks listed. Nothing exists south of Kings and the Oval. Which is pretty much how the rest of London thinks of us.

Also I can see my office and my old house, but not my current one.
posted by Infinite Jest at 5:15 AM on February 1, 2013

This guy proposed to his girlfriend... in front of a crowd of photographers...

I suppose it's not possible to jump from there.
posted by pracowity at 5:16 AM on February 1, 2013 [2 favorites]

Every time I see a reference to "The Shard," I assume it's something from a dystopian sci-fi novel I haven't read. I know what it is and now I only make the assumption for a second, but it still happens every time.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 5:25 AM on February 1, 2013 [5 favorites]

OMG!?!?! THE GUARDIAN IS REPRODUCING, ITS EVERYWHERE, SO MUCH FONT, SO MUCH TERROR, EVERYWHERE I TURN I SEE "THE GUARDIAN" ITS LIKE SOME KIND OF HORRID VIRUS THAT HAS TAKEN OVER. DEAR LORD.....
posted by Fizz at 5:32 AM on February 1, 2013 [1 favorite]

I wonder what architecture pervs will end up designating the Shard.

I am rooting for the Shart.
posted by incster at 5:37 AM on February 1, 2013 [3 favorites]

After he takes her up the Shard, he could also take her up the Oxo Tower.
posted by mippy at 5:41 AM on February 1, 2013 [2 favorites]

See here for a giant zoomable nighttime panaroma taken from the shard before it opened (previously). Taken by these guys who were a bit naughty and climbed up to the top before it was finished.
posted by memebake at 5:46 AM on February 1, 2013

After he takes her up the Shard, he could also take her up the Oxo Tower.

Only after she's enjoyed herself atop the Gherkin.
posted by MuffinMan at 5:50 AM on February 1, 2013 [1 favorite]

So is this building occupied at all? We were in London in October and it looked like it was still under construction, so we never even bothered wandering over there.

I took a photo of it in the fog.
posted by backseatpilot at 5:51 AM on February 1, 2013

Every time I see a reference to "The Shard," I assume it's something from a dystopian sci-fi novel I haven't read.

I think shart. Essentially the same thing.
posted by pracowity at 5:53 AM on February 1, 2013 [1 favorite]

backseatpilot, the last I heard, they were having discussions with their first prospective occupant this Jan. So, still empty.

(Note to self - insert innuendo about Big Ben, the London Eye, and Thames Barrier)
posted by forgetful snow at 5:54 AM on February 1, 2013

See also these guys who climbed it when it was under construction and took some nice nighttime shots.

... Staying low, we then descended the other side of the scaffolding, right behind the security hut where we could see the guard watching TV, not the cameras ...

posted by memebake at 5:54 AM on February 1, 2013 [2 favorites]

After he takes her up the Shard, he could also take her up the Oxo Tower.

Only if he does it that way round. Everyone knows you never go Tower-to-Shard. At least not without a shower first.
posted by fight or flight at 6:01 AM on February 1, 2013 [1 favorite]

The Church of Scientology of London is a block away from St. Paul's Cathedral.

Huh.
posted by Sys Rq at 6:29 AM on February 1, 2013

Diamond Geezer's review.

Located at the far end, by the ticket barriers, only now does the visitor enters the true belly of the beast. This portal stretches back back back, past two concessions selling croissants and coffee to a discerning audience. Here at last is breadth, and depth, and a WHSmith which fills the Shard's southern corner. Won't you look at that view? The glories of London and the City are splashed across the covers of various current affairs magazines, the people so tiny, especially from the other side of the shelves.

posted by fight or flight at 6:35 AM on February 1, 2013

After he takes her up the Shard, he could also take her up the Oxo Tower.

Ooh-err, Vicar!
posted by acb at 6:38 AM on February 1, 2013 [1 favorite]

I hear you can almost see (the rest of) Qatar Pyongyang on a clear day.
posted by ennui.bz at 6:38 AM on February 1, 2013 [3 favorites]

backseatpilot, the last I heard, they were having discussions with their first prospective occupant this Jan. So, still empty.

Surely the two floors which are the Qatari royal family's London palace would by now at least have a retinue of servants keeping things afloat...
posted by acb at 6:39 AM on February 1, 2013

Every time I see a reference to "The Shard," I assume it's something from a dystopian sci-fi novel I haven't read.

It's a dystopian sci-fi novel we're living in. The authors are Milton Friedman and Margaret Thatcher.
posted by acb at 6:40 AM on February 1, 2013 [5 favorites]

68 floors

How quaint!
posted by deathpanels at 6:49 AM on February 1, 2013

Wow, for such a large city, London is really flat.

There were no geographical barriers to lateral expansion, unlike in, say Manhattan. So we spread outward, not upward. London is really huge. That bit you see in the movies? Tower Bridge, St Pauls, Oxford Street, Trafalgar Square and all that tourist stuff? Tiny part of the city. If you've only seen that stuff you haven't seen London.
posted by Decani at 7:33 AM on February 1, 2013

I was pleased to see that they had the Battersea Power Station marked. Apparently it is being converted into really expensive flats.
posted by TedW at 8:01 AM on February 1, 2013

London gets progressively less flat to the Northwest (the profusion of places with -hill in their name sort of gives the name away), but you can't see that far from the Shard.
posted by atrazine at 8:17 AM on February 1, 2013

You know in the horror movies when someone gets impaled with an absurdly long sword or improbably handy pickaxe and they look all shocked that they suddenly have several inches of cold steel sticking out of their chest and they clutch on to it, futilely, as they fall over off the ledge or into the water or down the bottomless pit?

This is like that, only done with architecture to a city instead of with a pitchfork to a hapless red-shirted meatbag. And it happened much more sloooooowly.

Although I suppose if you're going to go all dystopic on a city, doing it to London seems deliciously apropos, somehow.
posted by the painkiller at 8:20 AM on February 1, 2013 [1 favorite]

When I saw the first renderings I thought of it as the point of a dagger stabbed through the Earth from Qatar and emerging in London, and I've never not been able to see it that way since.

And to anyone who says it's at the wrong angle because Qatar's not on the opposite side of the world, I say "it's a curved dagger".
posted by George_Spiggott at 8:24 AM on February 1, 2013

And to anyone who says it's at the wrong angle because Qatar's not on the opposite side of the world, I say "it's a curved dagger".

Or perhaps a scimitar.
posted by acb at 8:26 AM on February 1, 2013

This makes me want to go to London real bad.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 9:14 AM on February 1, 2013

I like how south London dissolves into a haze

Actually, I had just switched back to this tab to say how unusual it was, for a North American anyway, to see a view of London that wasn't somehow centered on Big Ben -- which in fact is almost lost in haze.

they were having discussions with their first prospective occupant this Jan. So, still empty.

That's ... pretty unusual for a project of this magnitude. Generally pre-sales and pre-leases are a determinant of whether a project gets built. It's why Chicago didn't get the Calatrava Spire built. But I guess the Qatari royals have this much cash to burn?

I hear you can almost see (the rest of) Qatar Pyongyang on a clear day.

That's surprised me from the beginning. I mean, it's not like North Korea invented or owns the pyramid (!), but that was such a notorious icon of failure for so many years you'd think they would have avoided the comparisons. Especially if this one has any chance of sitting vacant.
posted by dhartung at 9:43 AM on February 1, 2013

Especially if this one has any chance of sitting vacant.

Avian porcine calling for dhartung on line 2. Seriously, there is so much money chasing central London property that it numbs any normal person's definition of the word "money".
posted by George_Spiggott at 9:55 AM on February 1, 2013

(Though between this and hilarious things like The Palm Dubai, I think I commented elsewhere about the irony of so much more or less oil-based money going into more or less sea-level property.)
posted by George_Spiggott at 9:59 AM on February 1, 2013 [1 favorite]

I worked on a fraction of a portion of one of the myriad levels of financing for The Shard.

I'm really sorry, London.
posted by bright cold day at 2:32 PM on February 1, 2013

Bubbles do burst, or so I've heard.
posted by dhartung at 12:03 AM on February 2, 2013