Even when I started at the centre in 1996 it was an exciting place to star-spot, especially on Saturdays. If you were on an early shift, you'd arrive and have to push past (or be driven in past) the hordes of girls waiting for Take That or whoever had been booked onto Live and Kicking. They and lots of other bands would often do an appearance on that and also either the Lottery or Noel's House Party and would consequently spend all day at the centre (dare I say in the Club? ... oh I just have...). Grandstand was still a major programme in those days, and so all afternoon VT and post-production would be alive with activity - even if footy wasn't being shown on the BBC live a great deal of it was (and still is) downlinked at the Centre and recorded with commentary for Match of the Day. Plus all the big sitcoms and panel shows being done in the evenings and the occasional special - it was still a great place to work, even if dramas had all long gone by then.
In the 80s, as a precocious youngster, I wrote to various heads of department with a view to visiting TVC, and wasn't disappointed.
I was given a grand tour of the newsroom and studios, and spent time milling around the various studios while they were in full production mode (Victoria Wood, Run the Risk, and other shows I have since forgotten). Even sitting in reception (now the stage door), I sat next to Paul Daniels, who joked with me when a driver and car arrived for him, but his diminutive frame was hidden from view by my (at the time) ample size.
The whole place reeked of stars and television history - and one couldn't fail to be impressed with the building. Sprawling and confusing it might have been, but there's nowhere in the world I would have rather been lost than right there.
Even two years ago when I taped a show there, it held the same quality.
I don't know if that feeling will be replicated in another site - but I hope it is.
Don't forget that there will almost certainly still be TV made at TV Centre after it's sold. The most recent plan is to make it into a 'Cultural Quarter' with the BBC leasing back studios and other media companies using the site:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010/may/26/bbc-television-centre-cultural-quarter-plan Selling it off totally for redevelopment is unlikely due to the listing and the current lull in property prices - in 2007 when it was first announced things were very different in that respect
Personally, I don't see why the BBC sees TVC as an 'all-or-nothing' building; why not keep the studios with a small part of the doughnut kept for dressing rooms, offices and so on, then sell off the rest? As has been said before, the building seeps history, every time I've visited you just get this special feeling about the place, especially in the older sections like the stage door and so on. It also makes financial sense; surely owning studios, especially one the size of TC1, and leasing them out to others when they're not in use makes more sense that paying huge fees to block book studios elsewhere? I read somewhere that the studios at TVC are finally making a profit, so why not keep them on? They're listed anyway, so whoever bought the site couldn't make substantial changes.
The Guardian's poll is currently about 70% against the decision.
Last edited by DarkestDreams on 16 June 2011 1:24pm
The studios work well; there's good audience-wrangling available; and the connectivity is great (every so often you'll find all five terrestrial networks are simultaneously relying on TVC).
But as others have said, the office space is pants. Despite being relatively modern buildings, Spur and Stage V have plenty of nasty little offices with no windows; there are baffling dead-end corridors all over the place; floors which don't match up - I once got a lift to the 3rd floor, walked along a corridor and found myself on the 2nd.
(There's a (possibly apocryphal) story about a newly hired BBC executive who got lost on his way to his office, so followed the fire exit signs, made his way back to Wood Lane, and started again from main reception.)
There are parts of the building which were supposedly built as temporary office accommodation which are still standing 30 years later, and there are some unrefurbished office spaces which aren't particularly pleasant to work in either (think single-glazed metal-framed windows that don't close properly and heating that gives you a headache). The East Tower looks like it's ready to fall to bits at any moment.
But the main block does have a lot of charm to it, and it would be a shame to see it used for anything other than making television.
Where else can you do this?
I earned my Blue Peter badge for taking part in that, you know.
Personally, I don't see why the BBC sees TVC as an 'all-or-nothing' building; why not keep the studios with a small part of the doughnut kept for dressing rooms, offices and so on, then sell off the rest?
Agreed! By all means knock down the East Tower, old scene docks, and the spur and canteen, but the main ring of studios could easily be refurbed. Some of the floors of the donut have already been touched up and look brilliant and modern.
Some of the smaller studios could be converted into scenery stores if the old scene store was demolished, compacting the whole operation without losing the site completely.
Personally, I don't see why the BBC sees TVC as an 'all-or-nothing' building; why not keep the studios with a small part of the doughnut kept for dressing rooms, offices and so on, then sell off the rest?
That is probably what will happen... just not BBC owned
Agreed! By all means knock down the East Tower, old scene docks, and the spur and
canteen
, but the main ring of studios could easily be refurbed. Some of the floors of the donut have already been touched up and look brilliant and modern.
Isn't the canteen included in the order for protection, as it was one of the first buildings, along with the doughnut?
As for suggestions of converting the other office space into useful modern accommodation, with proper routing, AC and other H&S requirements, you may be looking at more than the cost of a 'new build' for any potential buyer/leasee.
I'm sure there are many functions that can be found for such an iconic building that will allow TV production to continue and some use found for the additional areas.
Unfortunately, I have never had the oppotunity to visit TVC, but you can see the passion and enthusiasm of many for retaining it as a working buildng through just the posts on this thread.
Indeed, look at BBC South, a firm of solicitors now inhabitants the top floor of their building!
I know it's not really a comparison, but the old Westward/TSW studios in Plymouth at Derry's Cross were converted into offices for a firm of Solicitors in the 1990s after TSW lost the contract to Westcountry. I think the studio buildings were retained for space as the TSW Archive (who bought Westward's old programmes, IIRC).
I'm not sure where the archive is based now.
That office building has now been demolished to make way for a new office/accommodation hub; but in a further 'twist on the tale', BBC South West will re-locate to share the same Solicitors' new building at Sutton Quay, when they move from their current home (down the road from me on Seymour Road) next year.
I know it's not really a comparison, but the old Westward/TSW studios in Plymouth at Derry's Cross were converted into offices for a firm of Solicitors in the 1990s after TSW lost the contract to Westcountry. I think the studio buildings were retained for space as the TSW Archive (who bought Westward's old programmes, IIRC)
The South West Film and TV Archive was spun out of TSW as a charity to give a home to it's archive (TSW itself became a shoe manufacturer!). This included Westward's archive because they bought by TSW in 1981.
It wasn't just the solicitors in the building, for a while it was also the Plymouth base for Pirate FM
Quote:
I'm not sure where the archive is based now.
Melville Building
Royal William Yard
Plymouth
PL1 3RP