Spectacular stations: a new book puts railway architecture back on the agenda

Railway station with dramatic pillars, from 'Station: A journey through 20th and 21st century railway architecture and design'.

Christopher Beanland’s new book, Station, is a greatest hits of railway architecture, but it comes at a time when the monumental rail project feels somewhat under threat. A lack of political will and a surfeit of wayward planning have left many big ideas on the table, at a time when investing in railways feels like the most sensible transport strategy of all.

Hauptbahnhof, Berlin, by von Gerkan, Marg and Partners, 2006 (Image credit: Marcus Bredt)

Beanland isn’t big on the politics, but he does go large on the splendour, glamour and spectacle of the modern rail interchange. The very best of these stations – in a survey that takes in big names and locations from around the world – are often those that de-tangle and simplify the massive complexity of modern interchanges. On our crowded planet, rail doesn’t exist in a vacuum; it’s about glueing and grafting the old with the new, directing the flow of trains, goods and people ever onwards.

Station: a journey through 20th and 21st century railway architecture and design

RER, Paris, France, Auber Pods, 1971  (Image credit: RATP Collection)

The featured stations range from the mighty cathedrals of travel created in the early 20th century, to idiosyncratic artistic spectacles, subterranean installations, and everything from retro to deco, neo-classicism, brutalism, high tech and more. If there’s a criticism, it’s that Station cherry picks the 50 singular best stops at the expense of those more coherent examples of railway design that span whole lines, networks, even countries. 

Metro Station, Doha, Quatar, Qatar Railways Company, designed by UNStudio, 2020  (Image credit: Hufton+Crow )

As well as a best-of that covers everything from high speed to light rail, Beanland has enlisted some fellow travellers to enthuse about their best railway experiences. Station does its best to reanimate the romanticism of rail travel, rather than the commercialised reality. Many of the great buildings featured within are pointedly shown without their vital retail underbellies on show. Nevertheless, anything that heralds the railways as a triumphant and vital social space is to be celebrated: we suggest a copy for the desk of every freshly elected transport minister the world over. 

Kohta Station, Kohta, Finland, by Aalto University Wood Program, 2018/19 (Image credit: Tuomas Uusheimo)

Station: A journey through 20th and 21st century railway architecture and design, Christopher Beanland, Batsford, £25, BatsfordBooks.com, @BatsfordBooks

Also available from Amazon and Waterstones

(Image credit: Batsford Books)