The Architecture of the Internet: Discovering the aesthetics of London’s data centres Tom Ravenscroft
THROUGH MY DISSERTATION I EXPLORED the aesthetics of data centres, a disregarded building typology so far overlooked by architectural historians. Data centres, essential to our modern way of life, are the physical embodiment of the Internet age, and more than any other building they represent the age we live in. While most perceive data centres to be located in giant sheds in remote locations, like the Arctic Circle, these buildings are not characteristic of the typology. The Internet does not live in futuristic far-flung buildings; data centres are often hidden within our cities. Driven by a desire not to draw attention to themselves, data centres often inhabit existing buildings, occupying the previous structure’s fabric as ill-fitting clothing. Inhabiting many varied buildings, data centres do not share a common aesthetic. However, the uniform desire to remain unseen, combined with the common technological and security needs of a highly technical building, leads the buildings to share many traits. These traits, or tells, are not only useful for identification, but also combine to form a non-aesthetic, driven from the demand not to have recognisable attributes or conform to a particular style. The Internet does not live where you would expect. My thesis contains the results of a three-month long survey to locate, map, visit, photograph, and classify all of Greater London’s data centres, to provide an accurate representation of the typology. Overall, on my voyage of discovery I identified, visited, and photographed 55 data centres within Greater London. This figure alone dispels some of the myths surrounding their distance. While it is clear that data can travel very fast, and is in
some ways making the world seem smaller and the Internet seem ubiquitous, it is not located at random; it is concentrated in close proximity to London. Travelling on around 100 trains, tubes, and DLRs, and walking more than 200 miles in the process, I located data centres spread across 15 of London’s boroughs, including the furthest north, south, east, and west. The data centres are distributed across London and their locations are now publicly available online. Although data centres are spread across the city, there are some clear concentrations – I identified four distinct groupings. The most notable being the vast number based in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, with 24 out of London’s 55 data centres located in the borough. Despite perceptions of the Internet being ubiquitous, it is clear that the physical manifestations of the Internet are not evenly distributed across the city. Along with mapping all of Greater London’s data centres during my visits I took photographs of all the facilities, which are in my thesis and available to the public online at https://wheretheinternetlives.wordpress.com. At first glance the 55 data centres do not share many common characteristics beyond the same function. The buildings vary greatly in age, structure, scale, height, materials, and style. However, there are some distinctions between the various data centres, the first being the clear division between purpose-built facilities and retrofitted data centres. Out of the 55, only eight were originally designed to be data centres. Meaning that although data centres are some of the most technical buildings in the world, hosting the mechanics of society’s most digitally advanced elements, the vast majority in London are located 63