Warwick Street
The line of Warwick Street is marked on the plan
of 1585 (Plate 1) as part of the lane which led (in
terms of the modern layout) from Piccadilly to
Oxford Circus. This lane formed the boundary
between Gelding Close on the east and Mulghay
Close on the west; in 1651 it was referred to as
Dog Lane (ref. 152) and in the 1670's and 80's, when
building began here, it was called 'Marrowbone'
(i.e. Marylebone) Street or Lane. (ref. 153) On Ogilby
and Morgan's map of 1681–2 it is described as
Warwick Street, and in a deed of 1684 as 'Marylebone alias Warwick Street'. (ref. 23) The origin of the
latter name has not been discovered.
By the partition of Gelding Close in 1675 Isaac
Symball took all the ground at the south end of the
east side of Warwick Street, and extending to
the north side of the Roman Catholic church.
The remainder was taken by James Axtell (fig. 18).
All of the ground backing on to the houses on the
west side of Golden Square was granted away as
part of the curtilages of those houses, and much of
it was occupied by coach-houses and stables. By
February 1676/7 Symball had granted the
southern part of his ground, backing on to Lower
John Street, to John Wells of Marylebone,
yeoman, probably for some nine hundred or more
years, and the latter granted a sub-lease to John
King of Wapping, merchant, and possibly another
to John Norman, citizen and plumber. (ref. 154) In
August 1684 Martha Axtell granted fifty-oneyear leases of the northern part of her ground on
the east side of Warwick Street to Richard Tyler
of St. Martin's, brickmaker, who had undertaken
the development of her land bounded by Upper
John, Silver (now Beak) and Warwick Streets. (ref. 129)
The ground on the west side of Warwick Street
formed part of Mulghay Close, and its history is
described in Chapter XX.
In 1720 Strype described the south end of
Warwick Street as 'a Place not over well built or
inhabited', but 'at the upper End it hath some good
Houses on both Sides; the chief of which is that
where Sir Henry Goodwick dwelleth'. (ref. 155) The
west side of the street is now very obviously the
back of Regent Street, so that interest is largely
confined to the buildings on the east side. Even
here Nos. 7 and 8 are only the back of Holland
and Sherry's building in Golden Square, while to
the north of the church begins the long front of
Dormeuil Frères' building, of Portland stone and
in the same Louis XV Renaissance style as the
principal front to the square. In Warwick Street,
however, the composition is divided asymmetrically so that there are seven bays to the north of
the entrance pavilion, and only one to the south.
This brings the pavilion central with the axis of
Regent Place, in order to be seen from Regent
Street.
Nos. 1–4 (consec.) Warwick Street: Regency House
This building was erected in two stages. In
1909 Nos. 1 and 2 Warwick Street and the two
adjoining houses in Brewer Street were demolished
for the erection, in the following year, of a new
corner building, built to the designs of George
Vernon, of the architectural firm of Henry Metcalf and Thomas Greig of Great James Street,
W.C. In 1911 the adjoining houses in Warwick
Street, Nos. 3–4, were pulled down to allow for
the northward extension of this new building.
Messrs. Metcalf and Greig were the architects,
and the builders (of both portions) Messrs. T. H.
Kingerlee and Sons of Oxford. (ref. 156)
Regency House is a large building with a five-storeyed front of three bays to Brewer Street,
a narrow splayed corner, and a front of three
bays with a lower single-bay extension to Warwick
Street. The ground storey is composed of shopfronts between piers of unpolished granite, and the
upper face of Portland stone is treated as a giant
arcade, the piers embellished with rusticated Doric
columns, and each bay containing four tiers of
three-light windows. The steeply pitched roof
contains a series of large dormers. In its general
composition and mannered neo-classical detail,
this building recalls the later work of John
Belcher.
Nos. 10 and 11 Warwick Street
The recessed front of No. 10 is three storeys
high, stucco-faced and of early nineteenth-century
character. A modern shop-front, flush with the
street frontage, has recently replaced the original
ground storey, but the upper part remains unaltered. It is divided into three bays, each one
window wide, those in the slightly projecting
centre being divided by mullions into three lights.
The openings are plain and rectangular, and the
front is simply finished with a narrow cornice
surmounted by a pedestal-parapet. No. 11, three
storeys high and two windows wide, has a plain
front of stock brick above a modern stucco-faced
ground storey containing two doorways. The
upper face, with a raised bandcourse at first-floor
level and flat gauged arches of yellow brick to the
windows, appears to date from the late eighteenth
century.
Roman Catholic Church of Our
Lady of the Assumption and St.
Gregory, Warwick Street
This church, which was built in 1789–90, is
the sole survivor of the few Roman Catholic
chapels which existed in London during the
eighteenth century. Its erection was one of the
earliest manifestations of the Roman Catholic
resurgence which accompanied the gradual relaxation of the penal laws. A smaller chapel, belonging successively to the Portuguese and Bavarian
envoys who lived in Golden Square, had stood on
part of the site of the present church, probably
since 1724, and this long tradition of faith gives
the Warwick Street church its unique cachet.
In 1724 the Portuguese envoy moved into the
adjoining Nos. 23 and 24 Golden Square (ref. 28) and it
may reasonably be assumed that a Catholic chapel,
to which his diplomatic privileges entitled him,
was established there at about that time. Despite
the penal laws against the celebration of Mass, his
English co-religionists were evidently allowed to
worship there unmolested.
The chapel must have been a small building.
It was probably adapted from the existing outbuildings between the two houses in Golden
Square and the legation stables fronting on to the
east side of Warwick Street. A deed of 1700
which refers to the buildings behind No. 23
Golden Square mentions 'the room next the
Garden' and an adjoining room containing 'a stove
set with dutch tiles and wainscot over it'. (ref. 157) It
may therefore have been these, or similar buildings
behind No. 24, that were subsequently converted
into the envoy's chapel. He and his family and
staff probably had a private entrance from the
houses in Golden Square but the public entry was
through a narrow passage from Warwick Street (fn. a)
(see Plate 6).
The Portuguese legation remained in Golden
Square until 1747. (ref. 28) Its most famous occupant
was Don Sebastian Joseph de Carvalho, later
Marquis of Pombal and dictator of Portugal who,
soon after his arrival in London in 1739, issued a
series of minute regulations governing the conduct
of the services in his chapel. (ref. 160)
In 1747 the Portuguese legation moved to
South Street, Mayfair. (ref. 161) The two houses in
Golden Square, with the chapel and other outbuildings in Warwick Street, were then taken by
Count Haslang, the Bavarian minister, (ref. 28) who
remained there until his death in 1783; (ref. 162) the
danger of the chapel being closed by the withdrawal of diplomatic patronage and immunity was
thus averted. The priests who served the chapel
were technically the minister's chaplains, but in
practice they were evidently charged mainly with
ministering to the English Catholics in the
neighbourhood, of whom in 1780 there were
nearly a thousand living in St. James's parish, as
well as many more in St. Anne's, Soho. (ref. 163) Of the
forty-four priests who are known to have served
the chapel during its years under Bavarian protection, only three had foreign names. (ref. 164)
The statutory relaxation of the penal laws
began in 1778 with the passing of Sir George
Savile's Catholic Relief Act. This occasioned the
formation of the Protestant Association to procure
its repeal and eventually culminated in the acts of
mob violence which took place between 2 and 13
June 1780 and which have since been known as
the Gordon Riots.
Count Haslang's chapel was amongst the first
to suffer. On the night of 2–3 June, while another mob was destroying the Sardinian envoy's
chapel in Lincoln's Inn Fields, a large party of
rioters arrived in Warwick Street from Palace
Yard, where the Protestant Association had
gathered under Lord George Gordon. The
rioters forced an entry and set about the despoilment of the chapel, most of the furniture and
fittings being taken out into the street and burnt. (ref. 165)
The exact extent of the damage inflicted remains uncertain. According to Horace Walpole
the chapel was 'broken open and plundered'; and
in another letter, Walpole specifically excluded
fire from the list of calamities which had befallen
the chapel. (ref. 166) But the most reliable accounts of
the damage are probably those written by Haslang
himself to his government; these reports, written
in French, are in the Staatsarchiv in Munich and
have not hitherto been published. In a dispatch
written only four days after the attack Haslang relates that on 2 June, having failed to obtain
military protection, he had time to save only the
altar plate and ornaments before the rioters broke
in. The altar-piece, together with the organ,
balustrades, awnings and pews were broken up and
the Mass books burned in the street. The military
then arrived and the rioters dispersed. The chapel
itself was evidently not burned or de-roofed, for in
a later report Count Haslang refers to the soldiers,
who were still guarding the premises, as sleeping
upon straw in the chapel. (ref. 121) The damages for
which he claimed compensation against the British
government amounted to £1300, but the only
structural repairs required seem to have been
to the entrance, and most of the sum claimed was
evidently for the furniture, fittings, books and
vestments 'detrué, pillé volé et Brulé'. (ref. 167)
Haslang's dispatches are also illuminating about
the altar-piece, a 'tres beau morceaux' representing
the Descent from the Cross, (ref. 121) for he stated that it
was the work of the Chevalier Casali. This was
the Italian painter Andrea Casali who worked in
England between 1741 and 1766. He executed
other altar-pieces (since removed) for the chapel
of the Foundling Hospital and for St. Margaret's
Church, Westminster. (ref. 168) However, later writers
have attributed the Warwick Street altar-piece to
Lo Spagnoletto and a similar work in the Sardinian
envoy's chapel in Lincoln's Inn Fields to Casali. (ref. 169) (fn. b)
Haslang's contemporary attribution is the most
reliable, as indeed is his account of the whole
incident.
There appears to be no record of the repair and
reconsecration of the chapel, but it was evidently
in use again in 1783, for after the death of Count
Haslang on 29 May of that year (ref. 171) a solemn dirge
was sung 'at the Bavarian ambassador's chapel in
Warwick Street.' (ref. 162) (fn. c) The chapel continued to be
the Bavarian minister's chapel until Haslang's
successor removed from Golden Square in 1788. (ref. 28)
With the withdrawal of diplomatic protection,
some new arrangements were clearly necessary if
the Warwick Street chapel was to remain open.
Fortunately the animosities stirred up by the
Gordon Riots had largely subsided and the position of English Catholics had become less insecure.
It was no longer impossible to establish a permanent Catholic church in the West End of
London which would be under the control of the
bishop of the district and, though unprotected by
diplomatic privilege, free from the uncertainties
attached to an embassy chapel.
The bishop of the London district was at this
time James Talbot. In 1787 he had made an
abortive attempt to establish a church in York
(now Duke of York) Street, behind No. 8 St.
James's Square, where the Spanish ambassador had
his chapel and which Bishop Talbot feared 'in
case of rupture between this country and Spain
must be immediately shut, and the public deprived
of the benefit of it, perhaps for ever'. This scheme
was never carried out, and by 1791, when a chapel
adjoining the Spanish embassy in Spanish Place was
opened, the York Street chapel had been closed. (ref. 173)
Bishop Talbot then turned his attention to the
Bavarian chapel. At the time of the departure of
the minister from Golden Square in 1788 the
bishop obtained eight- and nine-hundred-year
leases of the two vacant houses, together with the
chapel and other outbuildings, and in September
he assigned the ground behind the houses,
measuring 42 feet 9 inches by 75 feet with a
frontage to Warwick Street, to six trustees for the
erection of a new church. (ref. 174) He also obtained the
patronage of the Elector of Bavaria, (ref. 175) and in the
latter part of 1788 he and a committee of twentytwo prominent Catholics appealed for funds for
the erection of a new chapel. Building began in
the spring of 1789 and the new church was opened
on 12 March 1790, the feast of St. Gregory the
Great, to whom it was dedicated (ref. 176) (Plates 12c,
13, fig. 21). <The architect was Joseph Bonomi; the identity of the builder is not known.>
In their appeal the committee had stated that by
using the site of the old chapel the new building
would 'probably pass unobserved by the Public in
general' and the façade was therefore deliberately
so unobtrusive as to be hardly distinguishable
from any other small public building of the same
period. The new church was for many years
generally known as the Bavarian chapel, and the
Electors (later Kings) of Bavaria continued to pay
an annual subscription for its support until the incorporation of Bavaria in the German Empire in
1871. (ref. 177)
Relatively little restoration has since taken
place. Several alterations were made to the
interior in 1853, at about the time when the
church first became known as the Church of the
Assumption. A new altar-piece was installed,
occupying the whole east end, which was now
adorned with four Corinthian columns and six
pilasters and sub-pilasters. (ref. 178) These columns are
clearly visible in a contemporary drawing in The
Illustrated London News of 24 December 1853.
At the same time a fine bas-relief of the Assumption by the fashionable sculptor, John Edward
Carew, was inserted over the altar, at a cost of
about £1000. A new ceiling was also constructed
and the seats in the body of the church rearranged.
The architect was a Mr. Erlam and the builder a
Mr. Holder. (ref. 179)
A more radical alteration, involving the remodelling of the church in the Byzantine style,
was planned in 1875, but little work was actually
carried out. John Francis Bentley, later the architect of Westminster Cathedral, was commissioned
to prepare plans for improving what was then considered a mean old-fashioned little building. He
designed a basilica of marble and mosaic with an
eastern apse, side aisles and galleries. Work on an
eastern extension began, the altar-piece erected in
1853 being removed and Carew's bas-relief placed
over the sacristy door. But the discovery of two
deep cellars entailed heavy unforeseen expense and
only the apse was built. The side galleries (which
then extended to the eastern wall) were shortened
to their present length, and the floor of the sanctuary was raised and paved with marble mosaic. (ref. 180)
At about the same time a shrine was opened on
the south side of the church and a statue of the
Blessed Virgin which had been purchased by the
rector, the Rev. and Hon. Gilbert Talbot, was
placed there. (ref. 181) Bentley designed the altar for
this shrine, and the 'frontal', depicting the
Adoration of the Magi, is believed to be the first
occasion on which he included the human figure
in a mosaic design. The walls above and at the
side of the altar were covered with what Bentley's
biographer described as 'a truly appalling display of
silver ex votos' in glass cases. (ref. 182)
In 1900 Bentley was consulted over the completion of the decoration of the apse. The lower
walls were lined with marble, and after his death
in 1902 the work was continued under the superintendence of his firm by J. A. Marshall. The
mosaic in the semi-dome of the apse was executed
in 1910 and represents the Coronation of the
Virgin; Bentley had made sketches and, after his
death, cartoons were prepared by George Daniels,
the mosaic being executed by George Bridge. (ref. 183)
Bentley decorated the upper part of the apse
wall by dividing the surface into nine panels with
stone pilasters, which Marshall subsequently replaced with others of pavonazzo marble to carry a
deep entablature of white marble. Mosaic figures
by some other hand have been placed in six of the
intervening panels. (ref. 184)
Architectural description
The church has a modest brick front that is
almost domestic in character (Plate 12c, fig. 2l).
It is designed in two stages each of five bays, the
three centre bays forming a slight projection. The
brickwork appears to have been dyed red, but it
was probably yellow originally. The lower stage
consists of a large round-arched doorway flanked
by two tall flat-headed windows, the end bays
being occupied by slightly smaller versions of the
centre doorway. The doors themselves have
raised-and-fielded ovolo-moulded panels, the
centre one in four leaves, the outer ones in two,
while above them are fanlights with radial
glazing-bars. To all three doorways have been
added new, and decidedly unsympathetic, stone
surrounds. In the upper stage the windows are
round-arched with continued sills of stone. The
two end bays are glazed, but those in the centre are
blind with recessed brick surrounds. Above this
stage is a simplified entablature, the projecting
centre being finished with a triangular pediment.
The cornice and architrave mouldings are of stone,
and above the end bays is a stone-coped parapet.
The apex of the pediment is surmounted by a
gilded cross, and in each of the three middle bays
of the upper stage is a gilded eight-pointed star, the
outer two having beneath them the figure of an
angel. These ornaments, however, are very
modern additions; the stars were added in 1952
and the angels in 1957.
Figure 21:
Roman Catholic Church of Our Lady of the Assumption and St. Gregory, Warwick Street, elevation and plan
The interior of the church (Plate 13) is a
simple rectangle to which has been added Bentley's
semi-circular eastern apse. At the west end is a
deep sloping gallery which is continued along
both sides of the church, although it has now been
cut back a little way short of the east end. The
gallery is supported by iron columns cased in
wood, the capitals consisting of acanthus leaves
tightly moulded around the top of the column.
The gallery-fronts are designed in the form of
dentilled coved cornices, surmounted by patterned
iron railings which are broken at intervals by
panelled pedestals. The south gallery has four
round-arched windows and the north gallery six,
two of the latter being placed at the east end
beyond the gallery while the western two are
blocked by the adjoining building. At the back of
the west gallery is the organ, originally erected
in the 1790's and rebuilt several times, most
recently in 1960. The ceiling is coved, the
flat centre part being divided into rectangular
compartments of varying sizes by enriched ribs.
At the east end a series of broad steps leads up to
the altar, which is contained in the apse. This is
designed in three sections. The lower section,
finished with a moulded marble cornice, is
decorated with a pattern of inlaid coloured
marbles, while the second stage is divided into
compartments by pavonazzo marble pilasters supporting an enriched marble entablature. Within
the compartments are mosaics depicting the Virgin
and Child flanked by St. Gilbert, St. Gregory,
St. Joseph, St. John the Evangelist, St. Edward the
Confessor and St. Cecilia. The topmost section
comprises the domed head of the apse, an enriched
marble archivolt framing a mosaic depicting the
Coronation of the Blessed Virgin in Heaven.
Carew's plaque is now set high up in the wall face
north of the apse. It depicts the draped figure of
the Virgin being carried to Heaven by winged
cherubs, the lower part of the plaque being filled
by a radiant five-pointed star. The oblong frame
breaks into a slight curve at the top over the head
of the Virgin and is supported at the bottom by
two carved brackets. The font is said to be
'probably of c. 1788', (ref. 185) and was originally placed
against the south wall beside the confessional; it
now occupies the south entrance lobby. It is of
stone, and simply designed with an oval bowl
resting on a bulbous baluster-shaft having a
moulded base.
Beneath the north gallery is an altar, now
dedicated to St. Gregory, which was brought
from Foxcote House, Warwickshire, in 1958.
It is of multi-coloured marble with large panels
of green marble set into the sides. In the centre
panel is fixed a round plaque of white marble,
carved in high relief with the figure of a pelican
in her piety.
Alterations to the interior of the church were
being made early in 1963, when this volume was in
the press. In the eastern apse the mosaic depicting
the Virgin and Child was being replaced by a
large crucifix attached to a panel of red marble,
and the Lady Chapel on the south side of the
church was being refitted, all to the designs of
Douglas Purnell.
Nos. 18–19 Warwick Street
This building was erected in 1900. (ref. 28) It has an
interesting late Victorian Renaissance front of
stone, four storeys high, each finished with a bold
entablature or a cornice. The upper three storeys
are divided into three bays, with three windows
in the middle and two on either side. All the
windows are framed with moulded architraves and
those in the middle of the first and second floors
are dressed with pediments, triangular, segmental
and serpentine.
No. 20 Warwick Street
This building was erected in 1906–7 to the
designs of J. W. Randall Vining of Chancery
Lane. (ref. 186) It is the most attractive building in the
street, with a distinguished art nouveau front of
stone. The ground-storey shop-front is finished
with a simple entablature, and the main face of
three storeys, each with a four-light window, is
formed as a segmental bow recessed between
splay-sided piers. On the piers are well-wrought
lead rainwater-heads and pipes, and at the head of
each pier projects a scrolled bracket, supporting a
flat-soffited balcony that has a stone balustrade
broken by panelled dies, between which the
cornice-rail dips in segmental curves. In the gable
end is a three-light window, the middle light
round-arched and dressed with a cornice-label.
Figure 22:
No. 20 Warwick Street, elevation in 1906. Redrawn from a drawing in the possession of the London County Council