Whale on the Wharf Wins Innovation Award at 2026 ICE London Awards

The Whale on the Wharf at London's Canary Wharf has won the Best Project – Innovation Award at the 2026 ICE London Awards. 

The 12-metre tall sculpture depicts a breaching whale made from five tonnes of plastic recovered from the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans. Thornton Tomasetti collaborated with A-squared Studio Engineers and artist-architects STUDIOKCA on the installation, providing structural and geotechnical engineering services to Canary Wharf Group. 

Set in one of the deepest parts of the dock and directly above Jubilee Underground line tunnels, the cantilevered structure required substantial submerged foundations. Our team designed a frame using repurposed steel and, working with Canary Wharf Group and Holcim UK, helped develop “Bio-Espresso,” a bespoke low-carbon concrete incorporating biochar made partly from spent coffee grounds collected from cafés and restaurants across Canary Wharf. 

Used in the underwater foundations, the innovative mix achieved a 66% reduction in embodied carbon compared with standard CEM I concrete while exceeding the project’s structural performance requirements. 

Thornton Tomasetti’s CORE studio and Façade Engineering teams also contributed structural analysis and parametric design for the sculpture’s complex geometry and cantilevered loads when it made its original debut in Bruges, Belgium, in 2018.

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