Venue Review

Character: Modernised post-industrial red brick chic.

Funky Features: London’s most prestigious modern art gallery; stunning panoramic views, specially commissioned artwork for the spaces.

Location and History

Some people may only be satisfied with the cachet of the unknown: a secret venue, so cool only they know of its existence. This tiny elite won’t be interested in Tate Modern. But for everyone else, well, how funky can you get? This may well be the capital’s favourite building.

It’s hard to believe that Giles Gilbert Scott’s power station facing St Paul’s across the River was once close to demolition. True this character and imposing industrial building was long considered a bit on the stark side. But it’s hard to deny that the conversion undertaken by the then little-known Swiss practice Herzog and de Meuron has more than justified the Tate management’s leap of faith. It’s given us so much more than another gallery: a home for the nation’s modern art collection; a truly magnificent public space and the best view in London.

Interior

Few can enter the Turbine Hall without a sense of awe: this is architecture on an epic scale; yet the building also features areas that range in scale from the spacious to the intimate.

Materials and finishes strike a balance between industrial and domestic personalities: concrete yet organic; massive but light; curves and crisp right angles. Tate Modern is a place to see, and to be seen in; a place where just ascending the banks escalators from the turbine Hall to the three Gallery floors feels like an event.

It is said that people visit galleries for social, intellectual, emotional and spiritual reasons. For our purposes, the first of these takes precedence, but the other considerations remain in the back of our minds.

Spaces for Hire

The Tate Modern Restaurant, East Room and Members Room (with terrace) are now available to all companies for dinners, reception and meetings.
Level 7 offers versatile event spaces with stunning panoramas across London and access for guests is via the newly redesigned River Entrance, directly facing the Millennium Bridge.

An event at Tate Modern is a statement of confidence, grandeur and occasion and modernity. It provides a context that is flexible and adaptable, a setting that really is unforgettable.