‘Unity’ by Simon Hitchens – As part of the major regeneration programme at Kings Cross Central, Urbanest Properties invited Art Contact to commission a ‘Public Art’ sculpture for the main entrance to the newly designed building by Glenn Howells architect, accommodation for students which completed September 2013.

The redevelopment of the former King’s Cross Goods Yard, now known as King’s Cross Central, owes much of its appeal to the proud industrial heritage which formed it.

Simon Hitchens was commissioned to create this graphic sculpture which visually references the heavy engineering used in the area’s industrial past. Unity’s form is suggestive of two large and redundant cogged wheels.

The granite element symbolises the robust building materials used in the old Goods Yards, where commodities were moved about by rail and cart. The more technologically challenging blue resin element hints both at the Regents Canal and the, important part it played in the transport of goods, but also the inspirational, state of the art future being built at King’s Cross Central.

The simple graphic form of the sculpture can be seen as a stylised letter X, but also articulates the unity between two separate yet co-dependant bodies: a balance of essential opposites and a celebration of progress across the generations.