The Rebuilding of Oxford Street
A special interest attaches to Oxford Street because
something like a comprehensive plan for rebuilding
appears to have been evolved here earlier than for any
other portion of the Mayfair estate. West of Park Street, as
we have seen, a plan devised by the Cundys for rebuilding
Hereford Street as far as Camelford House with smart new
houses with stabling in front towards Oxford Street, was
with the second Marquess of Westminster for consideration in March 1863. (ref. 45) This plan also provided for the
rebuilding of the range immediately east of Park Street,
subsequently Nos. 489–497 (odd) Oxford Street, as shops
with houses over; it was here that rebuilding first occurred
to Thomas Cundy III's designs in 1865–6, with Hereford
Gardens following on falteringly in 1866–74.
Had these substantial buildings survived today, it would
be plain that the west end of Oxford Street was conceived
under this plan as a unified essay in the Second Empire
town-house style pioneered by Thomas Cundy III, just
like his schemes for Grosvenor Place and Grosvenor
Gardens under the Estate's contemporary plan for the
improvement of that area. However, even what was built
may have been only part of a grandiose plan to rebuild the
whole of the estate's northern frontage in this style by
patient stages, as a reproach to the rest of Oxford Street.
There are two clues to this. One was a high, unanswered
corner pavilion at No. 497 Oxford Street, which must have
been intended to have its response elsewhere in the long
frontage between North Audley Street and Park Street
(fig. 45: see also Plate 27b in vol. XXXIX). The other was the
treatment of two blocks further east, Nos. 407–413 and
Nos. 415 and 417 at the corner with Duke Street. The
former block, between Duke Street and Binney Street,
survives and even in its altered state offers an impression of
what Thomas Cundy III intended for Oxford Street. It
was not built until 1870–4, but its western half (Nos. 411
and 413) was organized as early as 1863–4, at just the same
time as the ranges further west.
The tenant here was Peter Squire, a high-class chemist
who previously had premises on the site, and his
correspondence with the Marquess explains why an
initiative was so urgently needed in this part of Oxford
Street. Squire was keen to carry out Cundy's design,
'notwithstanding that it far exceeds the expence originally
contemplated', but added: 'it must be remembered that
such a handsome and costly edifice will for many years be
surrounded by a filthy market, fostered by the neighbouring householders, and the stall people, protected as they
are by the Magistrates, set you at bold defiance to remove
them'. Later, Squire reminded the Marquess that because
of this overspill from St. George's Market he could not
expect adequate rent, 'nor can it be supposed that the
Public, which has for so many years been accustomed to
walk on the North side of the Street, will be induced to
change the route until the Street on the South side is
rebuilt'. (ref. 55)
Thomas Cundy III's contributions to Oxford Street
were confined to the elevations, so that lessees were
allowed to have their own architects to plan their premises.
But the fronts were very carefully worked out. In the
course of negotiations over Squire's premises, entresols
like those used over shops in Regent Street were
considered and rejected. Terracotta was also prescribed for
some of the cornice details, perhaps for durability and
economy rather than texture; Cundy was to use similar
small terracotta features in Grosvenor Gardens, and they
may have occurred also on Hereford Gardens and Nos.
489–497 Oxford Street, though in all these ranges the main
dressings were of Portland stone. More significant on all
these buildings was the use of red brick, which had
hitherto hardly been employed on the estate but was to
become virtually compulsory after the death of the second
Marquess in 1869. Another and interesting provision for
Squire's building, eventually not insisted upon, was that
the brickwork should have five courses to the foot instead
of the orthodox four. At shop level, the facing material for
the fronts was to be red granite, a specification that
remained standard for rebuilding along Oxford Street even
when Cundy had been supplanted. (ref. 56)
Had the third Marquess been content to allow Thomas
Cundy III to continue with this scheme of rebuilding, the
uniform frontage here adumbrated might have become a
reality. But in the years after 1869 it gradually became clear
that the new Marquess favoured greater variety, though at
first he allowed Cundy to continue designing the new
fronts. As has been said, circumstances delayed the
execution of Nos. 411 and 413, so that the other corner
block with Duke Street, Nos. 415 and 417 (now demolished), was carried out at much the same time. Here
again Cundy supplied red-brick elevations, but the
ornamental elements were reduced and bay windows—
quite alien to the tenor of the previous designs—were
allowed. Next door, the Deaf and Dumb Church (St.
Saviour's) was erected in the same years by Arthur
Blomfield and this, though in red brick, was naturally
Gothic and contributed to the growing discrepancy in style
of the new Oxford Street (Plate 46a). Cundy's Parisian
approach was now virtually doomed. The next opportunity for rebuilding was in 1875–6 at Nos. 431 and 433,
when Cundy seems to have been asked to supply
something Jacobean or Queen Anne. But the result was so
unconvincing that after this he retired from the architectural fray on the estate and acted solely as surveyor. It was,
however, probably Cundy who recommended J. T.
Wimperis as architect for Nos. 443–451 in 1876–8. This
was important as the first fully Queen Anne range on the
estate, and among the earlier examples of the style's use in
speculative building. Though its architectural merits were
moderate, Wimperis was careful not to depart too far in his
proportions and even his details from Cundy's lead nearby,
showing that Queen Anne and Second Empire were not
quite the poles apart that their several champions
sometimes claimed.
Queen Anne remained more or less the style for the rest
of the rebuildings in Oxford Street, though the first Duke,
ever a latitudinarian in architecture, would allow quite a
divergence of approaches. At the purer end of the scale
were Nos. 399–405 (demolished), designed in 1880–2 by
Joseph S. Moye with distinctly Dutch gables and much
cut-brick ornament (Plate 46c). More casual was the
stylistic approach of Thomas Chatfeild Clarke, who with
his son Howard designed no fewer than seven buildings in
Oxford Street for the Duke, of which only the large Nos.
385–397 (of 1887–9) remains. Quite why the Chatfeild
Clarkes were so favoured here is not known, but they
doubtless recommended themselves to the Duke as
surveyors with a large commercial practice in the City and
an informed interest in Liberal politics. The styles and
standards of the six buildings they undertook between No.
461 and No. 487 were variable; but Nos. 475 and 477,
which veered towards Gothic, had architectural merit, and
Nos. 479–483, built as showrooms for a firm of coachbuilders, were of technical interest (Plate 47b). How far the
Chatfeild Clarkes designed behind the front elevations is
usually unclear.
In 1880 the street's numbering was altered, the
Grosvenor estate as far as the corner with Park Street being
now allotted Nos. 381–497 (odd). By 1890 almost all the
southern frontage west of Davies Street had been rebuilt.
One exception was at the top of Davies Street itself, where
the present street alignment had to await an exchange of
land and the building of Bond Street Tube Station in 1898–1900; an undistinguished block was put up on the
corner site here, just outside the Grosvenor estate, in
1906–8. Close to Marble Arch, Camelford House and
Somerset House were replaced from 1913 by Frank
Verity's block of flats at Nos. 139–140 Park Lane (Plate 48a
in vol. XXXIX) and his Pavilion Cinema (now demolished)
facing Oxford Street. Besides these, just two small plots
remained to be filled, and both were given good buildings
in Arts and Crafts taste: Nos. 453–459 by Read and
Macdonald (1900–2), and Nos. 439 and 441, where in
1907–8 brick fronts were first rejected in favour of stone by
Balfour and Turner (Plates 46b, 47a).
Rebuilding seems to have had less effect on the
commercial character of Oxford Street than of some other
streets on the estate. A reduction in the number of food
shops was greatest in the St. George's Market district close
to Davies Street; but this decline, from eight butchers
recorded in the estate's sector of Oxford Street in 1841 to
one in the directories fifty years later, and from six to two
cheesemongers over the same period, had begun before
rebuilding got under way. The better-capitalized trades
naturally had greater powers of survival, partly because
their workshops were rarely located along the street itself.
They were often more severely restricted by rebuildings in
the smaller streets behind. Yet it is noteworthy that even in
1884–6 the coach-builders Thrupp and Maberly did not
take the opportunity of rebuilding to move their workshops to some less constricted faraway site, preferring still
to concentrate their showrooms and works on the ground
offered by the Estate at Nos. 421–429 Oxford Street. On
the whole the scatter of trades in this part of the street was
not so very different in 1890 from what it had been fifty
years before. The only speciality discernible besides
coaches was leather goods; the 1890 directory records two
leather-breeches-makers, four bootmakers, and one
saddler.
The first Duke had however taken characteristic care to
suppress all but one of the public houses on his sector of
Oxford Street, a thoroughfare deemed especially in need of
redemption because hundreds of workmen walked its
length every day on their way to and from their place of
employment. By way of compensation, he supported the
Reverend J. W. Ayre's attempt in 1876 to establish a
public house 'on the Gothenburg principle' in place of the
Rose and Crown at the east corner of Gilbert Street. This
building had already enjoyed an eventful history, for in
1844, shortly after its erection and fitting-up 'in a most
gorgeous style, and at a vast expense, for what is generally
termed "a gin palace"', retribution fell in the shape of a
calamitous fire which claimed six lives. Gin, which had
been pumped into one of many well-stocked spirit vats,
got into the gas and promptly set the Rose and Crown
ablaze. (ref. 57) Under the Gothenburg system, pubs were to be
proof against this kind of disaster, as private profits on
spirits were to be strictly limited, so that managers were
inhibited from 'pushing' sales. But the attempt soon
proved another débâcle. One of the prospective trustees,
the builder John Finch of Duke Street, fell under the
imputation 'that his mother was kept on the Sacramental
Alms list of the parish during his Churchwardenship, and
that he denies that she is his mother', and he had to be
passed over. When the 'Gothenburg Refreshment House'
was opened in October 1876 (the Duke having agreed to
accept substantially less than the economic rent), the
working man refused to be enticed into it, and after only
four months the trustees were wanting to transfer the lease
to the People's Café Company, which would pay the full
rent. (ref. 58)
With the building of Selfridges, started on the opposite
side of the road between Duke Street and Orchard Street
in 1908, the impact of the unified department store began
to be felt in this part of Oxford Street, and soon after 1918
commercial pressures built up on the Grosvenor estate's
sector. St. Saviour's Church for the Deaf and Dumb,
leased by the first Duke at a nominal rent, was significantly
first to succumb, ejected in 1922 in favour of the first part
of a capable building (Nos. 415–419) in the new
commercial style by G. Thrale Jell (Plate 48b in vol.
XXXIX). To its west, the less interesting Keysign House
(Nos. 421–429) was erected in 1937–9. But by that time the
scale of the earlier buildings had been dwarfed by
Hereford House (1928–30) further west, which destroyed
the houses and street of Hereford Gardens and ate up the
welcome open space between them and Oxford Street
(Plate 47c).
Since the last war just two rebuildings have occurred,
one of Nos. 399–405, the other on a much larger scale all
the way between North Audley Street and Park Street, of
Nos. 455–497. Though in the same international idiom,
they display the difference between sensitive infilling and
adhering to the street line (all that was possible at Nos.
399–405), and 'comprehensive redevelopment'. At Nos.
455–497, a strong cantilever over the shops is used as a
visual principle to separate them off entirely from what is
above them, namely student flats towards North Audley
Street and offices towards Park Street. At the time of
writing, Bond Street Tube Station together with the large
corner site next to Davies Street is being rebuilt, leaving
Nos. 385–397,407–413,431–437,439 and 441, and 443–451
as testimonies to the Grosvenors' previous reconstruction
of Oxford Street. Those buildings that remain have all
suffered from a fate common to major shopping streets, the
cavalier treatment of shop fronts without regard to the
character of the buildings above. Such changes have made
even fine buildings like Nos. 439 and 441 as commonplace
as others of lesser interest.
Nos. 375–383 (odd)
Nos. 375–383 (odd) are at present (1978) being rebuilt
together with the premises behind in Davies and
Weighhouse Streets. The site has a complicated history,
since the original alignment of the top of Davies Street did
not follow the main course of the street but was skewed
back north-westwards along the line of South Molton
Lane. Only a small part of the frontage to Oxford Street
was ever on the Grosvenor estate, and when the
improvements which led to the present layout were made
in 1898–1900 in connexion with the new Central London
Railway, the freehold of this small site was disposed of.
The Central London Railway from Bayswater to the
City passing under the length of Oxford Street, was first
proposed in 1890 by a consortium working through the
solicitors Ashurst, Morris, Crisp and Company, who
considered applying for ground at the corner of Oxford
Street and Park Lane for a station. The Duke's solicitor,
H. T. Boodle, thought 'the railway was not wanted and
could not pay', and the Estate was among the opponents
who helped scotch the Bill in July 1890. A revival of the
scheme was soon mooted, and this time the promoters took
care to consult the Duke's interests by enquiring as to his
'wishes in improving the northern end of Davies Street',
with a view to siting a station here. At first the Duke
signed a petition against the Bill, but his attitude appears to
have changed early in 1891 on discovering that the new
promoters included several financiers close to the Prince of
Wales, of whom the two most important, Ernest Cassel
and H. L. Bischoffsheim, resided upon the estate. (ref. 59)
Instead, clauses were inserted safeguarding the interests of
the Grosvenor, Portland and Portman estates, and the Bill
became law in August 1891. (ref. 60) The Act provided inter alia
that if the Central London Railway Company decided to
build a station near Davies Street, it should be obliged, in
exchange for the necessary powers of compulsory purchase
of land on the Grosvenor estate, to straighten the top of the
street. (ref. 61)
Building of the railway only began following the
company's appointment of a new and influential board in
1895. In the following year they considered excluding the
station at Davies Street and the street improvements there
from their programme of works, as they were not obliged
to proceed with this part of the undertaking. But after
pressure from the Vestry, a new agreement between the
Duke and the company was negotiated in June 1897. By
this arrangement the Duke presented to the company the
site scheduled to be purchased under the Act of 1891,
together with an additional small piece of land between
this and the Westminster Electric Supply Corporation's
premises in Davies Street; in return, the company agreed
to carry out the street improvements and build the
station. (ref. 62) Work began in 1898 and was still not quite
finished when the Prince of Wales opened the Central
London Railway in June 1900. This was partly because of
difficulties following the London County Council's
objection to a slight narrowing of the proposed width at the
top of Davies Street. However the new Bond Street
Station was opened in September 1900, by which time the
street improvements were probably complete. (ref. 63)
The surplus land between the station and Davies Street,
not being wanted by the company, was offered to the
Estate, which, however, declined to buy it. It was
eventually sold in 1906 to a Mr. Henry Bailey, who made
an agreement whereby the builders Perry Brothers took a
lease of the site with an option to purchase and erect shops
with chambers over. An undistinguished building in red
brick and terracotta (with a Lyons Corner House on the
ground floor) was duly erected here in 1906–8 to designs by
William Arthur Lewis; (ref. 64) it was demolished in the early
1970's.
The Bond Street Tube Station itself had, despite the
first Duke's reservations, been built with a façade of the
terracotta and glazed bricks used elsewhere along the
Central London Railway. (ref. 65) However in the 1920's the
station was largely rebuilt. In 1923 escalators were
installed and in 1927 a new booking-hall was built. A low
but distinctive fascia towards Oxford Street was also
erected at about this time to the design of Charles Holden
of Adams, Holden and Pearson, with a plain facing of
Portland stone and an overhanging canopy with the
characteristic broad blue band later so common on
Underground stations. The date traditionally given for
this work is 1924, which puts it among the earliest of
Holden's undertakings on London's Underground network. (ref. 66) This façade disappeared in 1976, when the station
was again rebuilt to allow for the construction of the
Jubilee Line.
Nos. 385–397 (odd)
Nos. 385–397 (odd) were rebuilt as a range of shops
with four storeys above in 1887–9 to the designs of T.
Chatfeild Clarke and Son. The leases here having expired
in 1886, Chatfeild Clarke was chosen as architect by the
Duke for the rebuilding tenants agreed by the Estate:
Edwin and Albert Marples (Nos. 385–389); George Ward,
fruiterer (Nos. 391 and 393); and George Trenchard Cox,
grocer (Nos. 395 and 397). Clarke's design was soon
approved, and building took place under E. Lawrance and
Sons for the Marples and for Ward, and Charles Cox of
Hackney for George Trenchard Cox. Lawrances' tenders
for their parts came to just over £9,500. The range has
early French Renaissance detail, especially at roof level,
and is built of red Bracknell bricks with dressings of
Ancaster stone. (ref. 67) The shop fronts have naturally been
much altered.
Nos. 399–405 (odd)
Nos. 399–405 (odd), covering the Oxford Street
frontage between Gilbert Street and Binney Street, consist
of a compact block of offices and flats designed for Lloyds
Bank by Sir John Burnet, Tait and Partners. (ref. 68) Built in
1967–70, it is square in outline and faced in concrete
panels, but relieved from monotony by a first floor of
unusual height with a recessed storey immediately above.
The previous building on the site was a range of shops
with chambers above leased to Edwin Hollis, a pork
butcher, designed by his architect, Joseph S. Moye, and
built by H. Saala in 1880–2. Saala's tender was for £10,672.
The elevations were in an elaborate Queen Anne style, with
granite piers between the shops and plenty of ornament on
the red-brick upper storeys (ref. 69) (Plate 46c).
Nos. 407–413 (odd)
Nos. 407–413 (odd) are now the forlorn survivors of
Thomas Cundy III's considerable contributions to Oxford
Street. The history of rebuilding here goes back to 1861,
when Peter Squire wished to reconstruct his high-class
chemist's shop at the corner with Duke Street. His
application was deferred until 1863, and in the following
year Cundy produced an elevation, details of which were
settled after prolonged negotiation with Squire and his
architect George Lansdown. Then Squire was granted a
postponement, so that he could include the next-door
premises in his rebuilding. The building contracts for the
enlarged site, covering the present Nos. 411 and 413
Oxford Street, were finally exchanged in October 1869 and
Cundy's design for this part was built without significant
alteration in 1870–2. Squire's builder was J. Morter, and
the materials were red Essex bricks, with some dressings in
Portland stone and some in Doulton's terracotta; the
carver was a Mr. Estcourt. (ref. 70)
On the eastern half of the site (Nos. 407 and 409) Samuel
Mart, a fruiterer, applied for rebuilding terms in March
1872. Later in the year Cundy submitted an elevation
extending the fronts of Nos. 411 and 413, to which Mart's
architects Tolley and Dale (who had already built at Nos.
415 and 417) had to conform. Alfred Thomas of New
Cross undertook the construction in 1873–4. (ref. 71)
Cundy's design for this short range was essentially
similar to that for the larger Nos. 489–497 Oxford Street
and his purely residential range at Hereford Gardens.
Since these have now disappeared, Nos. 407–413 has an
interest disproportionate to its present appearance. Its
display of red brick, terracotta dressings and prominent
roofs heralded the kind of treatment that was to prevail on
the estate throughout the first Duke's day, even if Cundy's
characteristic French and Italian detailing was to be
jettisoned.
Nos. 415–419 (odd)
Nos. 415–419 (odd), a commercial building erected in
stages between 1923 and 1935, occupy the sites of two
previous buildings. Nearer Duke Street, at Nos. 415 and
417, was a group of shops with chambers over, designed by
Tolley and Dale with fronts by Thomas Cundy III, and
erected by J. M. Macey in 1870–1. The corner site was the
responsibility of Thomas B. Linscott, a baker, but there
was some difficulty with No. 417, which Macey eventually
built on his own account. Cundy's elevations and materials
were similar to those at Nos. 407–413, but less ornamental. (ref. 72) The other building to occupy this site was the church
of St. Saviour's, an important building at the corner with
Lumley Street which is separately discussed.
The church site (No. 419) was the first to fall vacant, and
in April 1923 G. Thrale Jell produced designs for shops,
showrooms and offices here for Wotton and Son. The
elevation that he submitted to the London County Council
was substantially different from that built by F. D.
Huntington Limited in 1923–4, but both were meant to be
part of a scheme for the whole block. No. 419 soon became
Selfridges' wholesale department. (ref. 73) At the other end of the
site, No. 415 was rebuilt for Horne Brothers in 1925, but
the linking portion at No. 417 had to wait until 1935. (ref. 74) In
both cases the architects were Wimperis, Simpson and
Guthrie, but so far as is known they carried out Jell's
elevations. The range forms one homogeneous block, with
well-disposed metal windows between stone-fronted piers
and rounded corners, and showing in a pared-down
version the influence of Frank Verity (Plate 48b in vol.
XXXIX). In 1930–2 the freehold of the building was sold by
the Grosvenor Estate.
St. Saviour's Church for the Deaf and Dumb
St. Saviour's Church for the Deaf and Dumb (Plate
46a, fig. 44: see also Plate 29c in vol. XXXIX). This church,
built in 1870–4 and demolished in 1923, owed its existence
entirely to the exertions of one of the most active Victorian
charitable societies, the (Royal) Association in Aid of the
Deaf and Dumb. The Association had been founded in
1854 to systematize the works of assistance and education
begun in 1841 by the Institution for the Employment,
Relief and Religious Instruction of the Adult Deaf and
Dumb. By 1870, under the guidance of the Reverend
Samuel Smith, for many years chaplain and secretary to
the Association, it ministered to some two thousand deaf
and dumb people living in London and sorely needed a
permanent centre. In 1860 an informal committee began to
propagandize for the erection of the church, on the
grounds that the secular character of the rooms used for
services led to a 'want of proper reverence' on the part of
some of those attending. The Association at first opposed
this suggestion, but soon fell in with it and set up a building
fund. (ref. 75) By 1867 over £2,500 had been received and sites
began to be considered. One in the Somers Town district
was being negotiated for in 1869, when it was announced
that the Marquess of Westminster was prepared to offer
the plot at the corner of Oxford Street and Lumley (then
Queen) Street for sixty years at a nominal rent of ten
shillings per year. (ref. 76)
Figure 44:
St. Saviour's Church (demolished), plan
The principal intermediary between the Association
and the Estate in this negotiation had been Lord Ebury,
brother of the second Marquess and for many years a
prominent trustee and vice-president of the Association.
The unusually favourable terms were ratified on behalf of
the Estate by Earl Grosvenor, who after succeeding his
father in October 1869 continued to interest himself in the
project. His request that the church should be 'a Gothic
building of red brick with black lines, terra cotta etc.' with
'a suitable sloping roof' was largely heeded by the
Association's architect, (Sir) Arthur Blomfield, who had
been chosen by December 1869. (ref. 77) Blomfield was doubtless
appointed because he was brother-in-law of one of the
Association's most active trustees, Arthur Henry Bather,
who was the deaf husband of Lucy Elizabeth Blomfield
('Aunt Lucy'), the writer of children's books and daughter
of the famous Bishop Blomfield of London. The choice of
architect was a good one, since Arthur Blomfield was adept
at the planning of cheap or special churches and showed
his originality more often in these instances than in his
run-of-the-mill ecclesiastical practice. For him, the
commission led to further work on the Grosvenor estates,
at St. Peter's, Eaton Square, St. Mark's, North Audley
Street and St. Mary's, Bourdon Street.
The building was to occupy a frontage of fifty feet to
Oxford Street and some seventy-five feet stretching back
into Lumley Street; a small site to its south was reserved
for the erection of a chaplain's residence. The plans,
authorized by the new Marquess in January 1870, included
a lecture-hall and committee-room in the basement. The
church itself was to hold two hundred and fifty deaf and
dumb, but could accommodate a rather bigger ordinary
congregation, since it was agreed with the Reverend J. W.
Ayre of St. Mark's that it should come under his
jurisdiction and be available also for the poor of his
parish. (ref. 78) In June 1870 an appeal for further funds was
published in The Times over the names of several eminent
clerics, peers and politicians (among them Lord Ebury,
Lord Shaftesbury, Gladstone and A. P. Stanley) and on 5
July the foundation stone was laid by the Prince of Wales at
the north end of the building facing Oxford Street. Present
on this occasion were the Marquess and Marchioness of
Westminster and Lord and Lady Ebury, while the
Archbishop of York conducted the service. (ref. 79)
Visibility and light were the prime requirements for this
unique church. To supply these, Blomfield took a leaf from
the book of Victorian Nonconformist church-planning.
Discarding strict orientation, he produced a centralized
plan surmounted by a lofty octagon with pitched roof, and
a small attached apsidal chancel to the north. The sturdy
roof structure of the octagon was concealed by an elegant
stellar vault in wood; the apse was also vaulted, but in
stone. The main vault was to have been also of stone, but
for this as for other more costly features funds did not
suffice. The exterior formed an imposing if slightly
disjointed design in red brick with Bath-stone dressings.
The narrow apse projected abruptly in the centre of the
Oxford Street front, with a slim bell turret close by in the
north-west position, on which was a niche filled in 1877
with a statue of the Good Shepherd by Joseph Gawen, a
deaf and dumb sculptor. In style, the church adhered to a
strict thirteenth-century Gothic, with lancets, simple
tracery and high tile roofs. Work began in 1870, the builder
being J. M. Macey, but was delayed by lack of funds, and
St. Saviour's was not formally opened until 1873 or 1874;
the final cost came to something over £7,500. (ref. 80)
A small piece of land to the south of the church had been
reserved for a clergy house, but because the Royal
Association (as it became in 1874) lacked money
Blomfield's simple design for the site could not be carried
out until 1876–8, the builder again being Macey and Son. (ref. 81)
The lease of church and residence, running from 1871, was
finally exchanged in 1880. (ref. 82)
At first the church had few fittings of note, but these did
include three stained-glass windows in the lancets of the
apse by Heaton, Butler and Bayne. The tall reredos in
mosaic, depicting the Crucifixion with St. Mary and St.
John, was a memorial to A. H. Bather; by the time of the
church's demolition it was flanked on either side by
formalized representations of trees, painted on gold
grounds. The other chief feature of the chancel was the
pair of ambones which Blomfield built into the dwarf screen
beneath the chancel arch instead of a formal pulpit and
lectern. The upper walls of the body of the church were left
in plain brick. At one stage it was intended that a Mr.
Maguire should fresco the bare lower walls, but this
scheme did not get far. The fittings here included a
number of tablets and a large painting of Christ healing the
deaf and dumb by Thomas Davidson. At the south
(liturgically west) end, a vestibule and small baptistry with
permanent font dating from 1893 were surmounted by a
deep raked gallery. In the lecture room below was a
statuary group of Sir Arthur Fairbairn and his sister by
Woolner. (ref. 83)
The church continued its work without interruption
until 1920, when it was made plain to the Royal
Association that their lease would not be renewed in 1931.
The Grosvenor Estate was in fact anxious to get possession
of the site for redevelopment and offered £10,000 for
surrender of the lease at the end of 1920. This was refused,
and in March 1921 the Association enquired what the cost
of the freehold might be under the Act for Enfranchisement of Sites of Public Worship of 1920. An impossibly
high price of £60,000 was suggested by Boodle, Hatfield
and Company. The only alternative accommodation
offered by the Estate was St. Philip's, Buckingham Palace
Road, which the Association thought quite unsuitable. But
the Estate remained intransigent on the questions of
renewal or of the cheap sale of the freehold. In July 1922
the Association therefore agreed to surrender their lease
for £15,000 and to move out at the end of the year. (ref. 84) The
last service was held on 31 December 1922. The Royal
Association kept a centre in Oxford Street, but their new
purpose-built church, designed by Edward Maufe, was
constructed at Acton. St. Saviour's, Armstrong Road,
Acton, was opened in 1925 and contains a number of the
fittings from the old church in Oxford Street.
Keysign House:
Nos. 421–429 (odd) is a plain office
building with shops below of 1937–9, erected to designs by
Trehearne and Norman Preston and Company for London
County Freehold and Leasehold Properties Limited. (ref. 85) It
replaced premises put up and partly occupied by Thrupp
and Maberly, old-established coach-builders hereabouts
and latterly motor-body builders. This earlier building, in
a lumpy Tudor style and faced in red brick with terracotta
dressings, had been erected in 1884–6, partly by William
Brass and partly by Perry and Company, to the designs of
Henry S. Legg and Arthur Kinder. (ref. 86)
Nos. 431 and 433
Nos. 431 and 433 are the first of an extant series of the
first Duke's rebuildings in Oxford Street which have
shallow sites backing on to North Row or on to the backs of
the buildings there. The leases here fell out in 1874, and
William Adkins, a linen-draper, was enticed from a nearby
site to build houses with shops here. These were erected in
1875–6, and though neither Adkins' architect nor his
builder seems to be recorded, it is fairly clear that Thomas
Cundy III had much to do with the elevations. These,
according to the Duke's decree, were to be 'red brick but
somewhat different from the rest of Oxford Street'. The
result is a curious and not very confident or pleasing essay
in a gabled Jacobean style, utterly distinct from Cundy's
French-inspired work elsewhere in the street. (ref. 87) <According to the Building News in 1883, the architect was F. Boreham and the builder William Macey.>
Nos. 435 and 437
Nos. 435 and 437 were rebuilt in 1889–90 for the
National Penny Bank, an institution devoted to 'the
promotion of thrift among the working classes' which had
in 1875 been allowed to occupy premises on this site at a
low rent as a short-term measure. Eventually the bank
authorities were asked to vacate or rebuild. They chose the
latter course, and the present building was erected in a
style approximating to that of Nos. 431 and 433, in the
usual red brick with stone dressings (Plate 47a). The
builder was William Scrivener. (ref. 88)
Nos. 439 and 441
Nos. 439 and 441 occupy one of the only two sites on
the Grosvenor estate's frontage to Oxford Street to be
rebuilt between 1890 and 1914. The site has a narrow front
but is broader at the back towards North Row. In October
1903 John Wells, a silversmith, was permitted by the
Grosvenor Board to rebuild on his own account in 1907,
using Balfour and Turner as his architects. When the time
came, Wells assigned his building agreement to George
Neal, a contractor of Kilburn. Under Neal's auspices, the
building was erected in 1907–8 and occupied by the
National Radiator Company (ref. 89) (Plate 47a).
Towards North Row the building has a pleasing, simple
brick character, but the Oxford Street elevation is an
interesting if eccentric example of Balfour and Turner's
later work. It is faced entirely in stone and relieved by
arches to the main windows carried on granite columns.
There is a small pediment over the centre at attic level. The
ground floor has suffered from a new and inappropriate shop
front.
Nos. 443–451 (odd) Oxford Street and No. 21 North Audley Street
Nos. 443–451 (odd) Oxford Street and No. 21 North
Audley Street, the first speculative range of shops and
chambers in the Queen Anne style to be built on the
Mayfair estate, were erected in 1876–8 by Thomas Patrick
to the designs of J. T. Wimperis. Thomas Patrick had with
his father, Mark Patrick, previously built Nos. 489–497
Oxford Street 'and lost money on one house', and he was
offered these five sites in compensation. The rents were
calculated on the basis of £5 per foot frontage. (ref. 90) Wimperis
was perhaps chosen as architect for this, his first work on
the Grosvenor estate, because of connexions with Thomas
Cundy III over projects in South Kensington. (ref. 91) The
elements of his design, though parading the Queen Anne
and red-brick motifs which the Duke approved, were not
in essence far removed from Cundy's own earlier designs
for Oxford Street. The granite facing which characterized
the original shop fronts along this part of the street may
still be seen at the corner with North Audley Street, which
is also marked by a sharp tourelle.
This range can boast artistic occupants of some
distinction. At No. 449 William Morris and Company had
their showrooms from 1878 until 1918, and No. 447 was
the office of the architect John Dando Sedding from 1886
until his death in 1891, and then of his assistant and
successor Harry Wilson until 1898. (ref. 50)
Nos. 455–497 (odd)
Nos. 455–497 (odd), stretching all the way from North
Audley Street to Park Street, and the western portion of
which is known as Park House, are the result of a scheme of
redevelopment by Fitzroy Robinson and Partners in
1961–9 to include shops, a students' hostel and office
space. (ref. 92) The development hardly regards the genius loci
and replaces a number of buildings which may be briefly
mentioned.
Nos. 453–459 (odd) Oxford Street and Nos. 22 and 23 North Audley Street
Nos. 453–459 (odd) Oxford Street and Nos. 22 and
23 North Audley Street, a small but elegant set of shops
with flats over, were designed by Herbert Read and Robert
Falconer Macdonald and built by Holloway Brothers in
1900–2 (Plate 46b). The client was E. H. Wilton of
Champion and Wilton, saddlers, of Nos. 457 and 459
Oxford Street. The building had three storeys towards
North Audley Street and five on to Oxford Street. The
ground floor was of Doulting stone, the upper storeys of
red brick with stone dressings, and the style a picturesque
and effective Arts and Crafts treatment. (ref. 93)
Nos. 461–487 (odd)
Nos. 461–487 (odd) were all rebuilt between 1883 and
1888 in red brick with stone dressings to designs by T.
Chatfeild Clarke and Son. But they were treated as six
separate buildings and allotted very different degrees of
ornamentation. Nos. 461 and 463, built in 1886 by E.
Lawrance and Sons at a cost of about £6,000, had a very
decorative front which The Builder believed 'partakes
largely of the style of the Brothers Adam'. Its disproportionately high and ungainly lower part, embracing an
entresol, was partly redeemed by some delicate Portlandstone carving. (ref. 94) No. 465, erected in 1885 for Hammond
and Company, leather-breeches-makers, appeared simpler
in front, but the tender of the builders, Hall, Beddall and
Company, was for £7,684. (ref. 95) Nos. 467–473, of 1885–6,
made a fairly basic Queen Anne composition built for
H. T. Batt and Son, veterinary surgeons, by Miller and
Brown; another architect, H. M. Newlyn, was also
involved here. (ref. 96) Nos. 475 and 477 were chronologically the
last and the most disciplined of the Chatfeild Clarkes'
designs, built by R. Cox in 1887–8 for Anthony Kitchen,
ironmonger, at a cost not under £8,000. The three tiers of
late-Gothic windows alternated with brick piers and were
crowned by straight, richly ornamented gables. (ref. 97) Nos.
479–483 had a broader but hardly less decorated front,
with piers of cut brick, dressings of Corsehill stone, and
large unorthodox windows with cast-iron mullions (Plate
47b). The building was used as showrooms by Holland and
Holland, coach-builders, and was fitted with a lift which
could take the heaviest coaches from the basement to the
second floor. The contractors were Colls and Sons and the
bills for their work (done in 1883–4) came to over
£17,000. (ref. 98) Next door, Colls and Sons were again builders
in 1883–4 of Nos. 485–487, a more conventional pair of
shops with residences above erected for Tautz and Sons,
breeches-makers, and B. Peal and Company, bootmakers;
Tautz's premises cost over £7,000, Peal's over £8,000. The
materials were polished red granite for the ground floor and
red brick above with Corsehill dressings. (ref. 99)
Nos. 489–497 (odd)
Nos. 489–497 (odd), built to designs by Thomas Cundy
III in 1865–6, were the earliest part of the Grosvenor
estate in Oxford Street to be undertaken as a range and the
only portion of rebuilding hereabouts to be finished during
the time of the second Marquess of Westminster (fig. 45:
see also Plate 27b in vol. XXXIX). This was also the first
instance on the Mayfair estate of tenants combining
together as separate lessees under a single architect and
builder, a policy which was so often to be followed over the
ensuing thirty years.
In March 1863 the Marquess agreed that all this
property together with most of Hereford Street further
west should be rebuilt according to a plan produced by his
surveyor, Thomas Cundy II. The Oxford Street site east
of Park Street was the first to be dealt with, and in spring
1865 tenants from here were temporarily rehoused in
property further west. The rebuilding tenants chosen were
Leonard Hammond, proprietor of the Gloucester Coffee
House at the corner of Oxford Street and Park Street;
Thomas Hoult, baker; Alexander Bartley, bootmaker;
Samuel Last, trunkmaker; and William Archibald Thomson, servants'-bazaar-keeper. Only Hammond, Hoult and
Thomson seem previously to have had premises here. In
exchange for eighty-five-year leases they had to agree to
rich elevations by Thomas Cundy III in the Second
Empire style, like those he was planning at this time for
Hereford Gardens and Grosvenor Gardens. There were to
be four shops besides the Gloucester Coffee House or
Hotel. Cundy must have intended that the range should
eventually stretch all or most of the way to North Audley
Street, for at the corner with Park Street (No. 497) he
accentuated the block with a full attic and high pavilion
roof, but supplied no answer to this feature at No. 489. The
materials for the fronts were red brick with copious
Portland-stone dressings and much ornamental ironwork,
and the builders for all the tenants were Mark Patrick and
Son. (ref. 100)
Hereford House.
The grand houses built in Hereford
Gardens between 1866 and 1874 enjoyed only a short-lived
aristocratic heyday, and Trollopes' fears about their
unsuitable situation soon proved justified (see page 175).
The proximity of Oxford Street caused problems, and as
early as 1903 the Estate Board considered, but turned
down, a proposal to buy the whole of the street for a
hotel. (ref. 101) But by 1916 the Board was prepared to co-operate
in any scheme to buy up the existing leases and use the site
for commercial purposes, its attitude now being that
'the character of the neighbourhood has changed and that
the time for the retention of residential property in the
position of Hereford Gardens has gone by'. (ref. 102)
By the mid 1920's the Board had decided to acquire the
site and advertize it for building purposes, and between
1925 and 1927 at least £137,000 was spent in purchasing
the outstanding leasehold interests. (ref. 103) By agreement with
the London County Council and Westminster City
Council the roadway of Hereford Gardens was closed and
building lines set back, particularly in Oxford Street. (ref. 104)
Figure 45:
Nos. 489–497 (odd) Oxford Street (demolished), elevation
Although an asking price of £775,000 freehold or
£38,750 per annum for a ninety-nine-year lease was set,
the Estate accepted an offer by A. W. Gamage Limited, the
department store in Holborn, to take a ninety-nine-year
lease at an annual rent of £20,000 for four years and
£30,000 for the remainder. A building agreement to this
effect was signed in September 1928. (ref. 105) Gamages proposed
to erect a store with flats above and for this purpose formed
a new company, Gamages (West End) Limited, which was
incorporated in the same month and then offered 500,000
£1 shares to the public. The company also arranged to
borrow £450,000 from the Grosvenor Estate in instalments as construction progressed. Of this £300,000 was
actually lent on the security of a first mortgage of the
building to the Duke of Westminster's trustees. (ref. 106)
Gamages' architects were C. S. and E. M. Joseph, but
the building had to be erected 'to the satisfaction of Sir
Edwin Lutyens and Mr. Blow as … Estate Architects' and
Lutyens, in particular, had a firm hand on the finished
design. He submitted elevations and a typical upper-floor
plan for the Duke's approval in 1928 (ref. 107) and several
of his sketches and detailed drawings for the building
survive among the collection of the Royal Institute of
British Architects. When the building was completed in
1930 Messrs. Joseph were described as the architects with
Lutyens as consultant. The builders were Higgs and
Hill. (ref. 108)
The result of their collaboration is a huge building of red
brick and Portland stone (Plate 47c). The influence of
Lutyens is evident in the general arrangement of the mass
of the building, particularly at the upper levels, and in the
large-scale classical features, designed to be seen from
below. These features give character to the building, and
what the architectural correspondent of The Times called,
in another context, the skilful manner of his 'stone binding
of the brick mass' is very apparent. (ref. 109) But the overall
design, which was no doubt the product of a compromise
between the reticent neo-Georgian then in vogue on the
Grosvenor estate, the need to give dignity to what was in
part a block of luxury flats, and the demands of a superstore, passed over the new possibilities then being opened
up in the field of commercial architecture and relied
instead on a scaled-up version of Georgian domestic
architecture with superimposed classical motifs.
Whatever its merits and defects, the building proved
disastrous for its owners. The flats, which were situated at
the eastern and western ends of the building above second-floor level and included as many as three bedrooms, two
reception rooms and quarters for servants, were successful, (ref. 110) but the store, which opened in September 1930, lost
money steadily and closed after only eight months. The
building had cost over one million pounds to erect and fit
out, and Gamages (West End) Limited was, in consequence, severely under-capitalized. With its creditors
pressing, the company appointed a Receiver in April 1931
and went into liquidation. (ref. 111) Undoubtedly a major factor
had been the depressed condition of trade and business
generally, and when the premises were put up for auction
the reserve price was not reached. The building then came
into the possession of the estate trustees as first mortgagees. (ref. 112)
In 1932–3 a consortium of six insurance companies
formed a new company, Hereford House Limited, which
purchased a two-hundred-year lease from the Estate for
£350,000 at an annual rent of £20,000. The aim was to
utilize the store part as a permanent exhibition and trade
centre for displaying the products of British industry, and
the building re-opened as British Industries House. (ref. 113) The
scheme received a good deal of favourable publicity in its
early years but interest waned and in 1938 the building
changed hands again. The non-residential section was
taken by C & A Modes Limited and reverted to its original
function as a store. Among alterations undertaken by
C & A's architects, Robin, North and Wilsdon (later
North and Partners), was the rebuilding of the first three
storeys of the central part of the Oxford Street front in
stone. The present shop fronts and C & A monogram date
from 1965. (ref. 114)
Nos. 527–539 (odd)
Nos. 527–539 (odd) see page 289.