page_title: Tate Modern
section_title: Initial redevelopment
hierarchical_section_title: Tate Modern / History / Initial redevelopment
caption_attribution_description: English: Panoramic view from Tate Modern balcony
context_page_description: Tate Modern is a modern art gallery located in London. It is Britain's national gallery of international modern art and forms part of the Tate group. It is based in the former Bankside Power Station, in the Bankside area of the London Borough of Southwark. Tate holds the national collection of British art from 1900 to the present day and international modern and contemporary art. Tate Modern is one of the largest museums of modern and contemporary art in the world. As with the UK's other national galleries and museums, there is no admission charge for access to the collection displays, which take up the majority of the gallery space, while tickets must be purchased for the major temporary exhibitions. The gallery is a highly visited museum, with 5.9 million visitors in 2018, making it the sixth-most visited art museum in the world, and the most visited in Britain.
context_section_description: For many years after closure Bankside Power station was at risk of being demolished by developers. Many people campaigned for the building to be saved and put forward suggestions for possible new uses. An application to list the building was refused. In April 1994 the Tate Gallery announced that Bankside would be the home for the new Tate Modern. In July of the same year, an international competition was launched to select an architect for the new gallery. Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron of Herzog & de Meuron were announced as the winning architects in January 1995. The £134 million conversion to the Tate Modern started in June 1995 and completed in January 2000.
  The most obvious external change was the two-story glass extension on one half of the roof. Much of the original internal structure remained, including the cavernous main turbine hall, which retained the overhead travelling crane. An electrical substation, taking up the Switch House in the southern third of the building, remained on-site and owned by the French power company EDF Energy while Tate took over the northern Boiler House for Tate Modern's main exhibition spaces.
  The history of the site as well as information about the conversion was the basis for a 2008 documentary Architects Herzog and de Meuron: Alchemy of Building & Tate Modern. This challenging conversion work was carried by Carillion.
caption: Panoramic view from Tate Modern balcony
exif: {"Image Make": "Apple", "Image Model": "iPhone 6", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "8.4", "Image DateTime": "2015:08:08 13:38:42", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "Image ExifOffset": "198", "GPS GPSLatitudeRef": "N", "GPS GPSLatitude": "[51, 30, 2899/100]", "GPS GPSLongitudeRef": "W", "GPS GPSLongitude": "[0, 5, 1411/25]", "GPS GPSAltitudeRef": "0", "GPS GPSAltitude": "5689/486", "GPS GPSTimeStamp": "[12, 38, 841/20]", "GPS GPSSpeedRef": "K", "GPS GPSSpeed": "0", "GPS GPSImgDirectionRef": "T", "GPS GPSImgDirection": "191002/1223", "GPS GPSDestBearingRef": "T", "GPS GPSDestBearing": "191002/1223", "GPS GPSDate": "2015:08:08", "Image GPSInfo": "720", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "1104", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "8040", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/2825", "EXIF FNumber": "11/5", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "32", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2015:08:08 13:38:42", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2015:08:08 13:38:42", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "2545/222", "EXIF ApertureValue": "7983/3509", "EXIF BrightnessValue": "24153/2170", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire", "EXIF FocalLength": "83/20", "EXIF SubSecTimeOriginal": "936", "EXIF SubSecTimeDigitized": "936", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "5662", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "3226", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CustomRendered": "6", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "29", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF LensSpecification": "[83/20, 83/20, 11/5, 11/5]", "EXIF LensMake": "Apple", "EXIF LensModel": "iPhone 6 back camera 4.15mm f/2.2"}