A Unique Location
At the mouth of the world famous River Mersey, the Mersey Observatory will offer unrivalled panoramic views of Liverpool Bay, the city’s skyline, the Mersey Waterfront, the Port of Liverpool and the Welsh hills. It will stand proudly alongside Crosby Marine Park and the iron men of Antony Gormley’s Another Place.
It will provide a unique vantage point from which to observe the dynamic tides, powerful weather systems, stunning wildlife spectacle and the global port with its international shipping traffic. The Mersey Observatory will bring these internationally important features of the magnificent River Mersey alive for visitors.
Mersey Basin Campaign is developing the £11.65 million Mersey Observatory proposals, which will see the existing radar tower demolished and replaced with a unique structure of international standing.
An International Design Competition
The design of the Mersey Observatory needs to be inspirational, achievable and far-reaching.
Therefore, in order to find the best possible design, a two-stage open international design competition was launched in October 2007 through the Royal Institute of British Architects.
Stage One drew an outstanding response of 92 preliminary concepts, all of which were submitted anonymously to ensure that the designs short listed for Stage 2 were selected primarily for the quality of design. The interest generated by the competition was staggering with Stage One attracting designs from architects as far afield as New York, Finland, Spain, Italy, Greece, Germany, Austria, China, Denmark, the UK and Ireland.
Stage Two saw the 92 submissions whittled down to 5 high quality schemes by an independent jury panel, were developed further and were exhibited to the public for 3 weeks in February 2008 at Crosby Library, Renew Rooms (Liverpool) and Seacombe ferry terminal. Comments and questions from the public consultation were fed into the selection process and - in particular - the selection interviews.
The outstanding winning design, by Duggan Morris Architects, was selected by an independent Jury Panel on 6th March 2008.
