Davies Street Area: Avery Row and South Molton Lane

Avery Row and South Molton Lane

These lanes follow the course of the Tyburn Brook which formed the eastern boundary of the Grosvenor estate. When building development began here the stream was arched over and made into a covered sewer, much of this work being done in the 1720's by Henry Avery, bricklayer, (fn. 1) from whom Avery Row takes its name. South Molton Lane (Plate 20c, 20e) was sometimes known as Avery's Passage, (fn. 2) but on Rocque's map of 1746 it is called Poverty Lane.

Most of the buildings on the west side of Avery Row (i.e. those on the Grosvenor estate) are small shops which were added at various dates in the angles formed by the side elevations of buildings in Brook Street or Grosvenor Street, but Nos. 27–30 (consec.) form a pleasant group of three-storey buildings at the south corner of Brook's Mews. They were erected in 1900–1 as coach-houses and stables with living quarters above by John Garlick to the designs of R. G. Hammond, (fn. 3) and now have uniform shop fronts on the ground floor and stuccoed façades above with jalousies to the windows, this appearance being largely due to alterations carried out in 1926–8 by Frederick Etchells and Gordon Pringle. (fn. 4)

In South Molton Lane Nos. 28 and 30 are part of Reginald Blomfield's former stabling at Nos. 1–7 Davies Mews (Plate 20e). No. 40, which has a long return front to Davies Mews and is of red brick with two storeys and attics to Davies Mews and a gable to South Molton Lane, was built as stabling in 1899 by Holloway Brothers to the designs of Balfour and Turner in conjunction with the rebuilding of Nos. 40–46 (even) Brook Street. (fn. 5)