The transformation of the Liverpool Street, Tottenham Court Road and Whitechapel stations for Crossrail / Elizabeth Line combined is the largest GRC project that has been undertaken in the UK.

GRCA Full Member Glass Reinforced Concrete UK Ltd (GRC UK) were responsible for the design, manufacture and installation of 32,000m² of bespoke fibre reinforced concrete cladding panels, with challenging geometry and onerous assurance requirements. The project specification required extensive performance testing including tests for bomb blast, impact, fire, light, reflectance and acoustics amongst others.

Over a two-year period 2,300 moulds were designed and manufactured using Solidworks 3D modelling aligned with GRC UK's 5 axis CNC robotic milling machines. The complex double curved cladding panels were manufactured and installed to a 0.3mm tolerance.

GRC was chosen for this project due to its aesthetic appeal, bomb blast resistance in a tunnel environment and the outstanding life expectancy of the product.

Client:                             Crossrail / Elizabeth Line
Main Contractor:             Laing O’Rourke
                                        & JV of Balfour Beatty, Morgan Sindall & Vinci
Architect:                        Grimshaw on behalf of Julian Robinson,
                                        head of architecture for Crossrail
Concept development and engineering for delivery: Bryden Wood
Installer:                          Vetter UK Ltd
Producer of GRC:           GRC UK
Scope of work:                28,000 GRC cladding panels to the platforms
                                       & concourse tunnels across three stations
Construction completed: 2022