Pembroke Square Area
In 1823 an area of some seven and a half acres, approximately bounded in present-day terms by Earl's Walk on
the north, Earl's Court Road on the east, Pembroke Road
on the south and the gardens of the houses on the west
side of Pembroke Villas and Pembroke Square on the west,
was let for speculative building under an agreement signed
by Lord Kensington on 23 May of that year. The undertakers were John Dowley of Howland Street, Fitzroy
Square, and Robert Tuck of Westmoreland Street, St.
Marylebone, for both of whom this was probably their first
building speculation. Dowley was a salaried employee of
the Westminster Commissioners of Sewers, by whom he
had first been engaged in 1810 as clerk of works. He had
been promoted to chief surveyor at a salary of £300 per
annum in 1817, when he was specifically requested to
devote the whole of his time ‘to the Service of the Commissioners’. (ref. 232) Tuck was a carpenter in regular employment,
probably with a brewery in Pimlico. In 1824 they became
the contractors for the building of the Kensington Canal
(see page 322), and Tuck seems to have given up his former
job. They also owned small plots of land in Chelsea, St.
John's Wood and Peel Street, Kensington. (ref. 233)
A crude plan of Pembroke Square (a name evidently
chosen because of Lord Kensington's Welsh connections)
was submitted to the Westminster Commissioners of
Sewers in May 1824. It was signed by Robert Tuck's
father, Richard Tuck, a builder, and probably shows the
layout as first intended with paired villas at the western
end of the long, narrow ‘square’ instead of the terraced
range which was eventually built there. (ref. 234) Otherwise the
layout was substantially carried out as planned. No architect's name is associated with Pembroke Square, nor is
there any record of payments to, or claims by, an architect
in the surviving accounts of Dowley and Tuck between
May 1823 and July 1826. It is therefore very probable that
they provided their own designs for both the layout and
for the houses in the north and south ranges, Dowley the
surveyor being perhaps mainly responsible.
The formation of the roadways of the square and building on its north side seem to have begun in the latter part
of 1823. (ref. 235) Apart from the laying of sewers, for which
Richard Tuck and another member of the family, Edward
Tuck, appear to have been responsible in 1824–5, (ref. 236) the
work in the square was done entirely under the auspices
of Dowley and Robert Tuck up to July 1826. There were,
however, some fifty or so sub-contractors and builders'
merchants with whom they ran up accounts in 1824–6,
though some items may have been in connection with their
contemporaneous contract for the formation of the Kensington Canal. The accounts record wages for the
labourers who dug the foundations and laid out the roads
and square enclosure, and bills from four brickmakers
(Lord Kensington's being the largest) and three timber
merchants, as well as from cement merchants, lime merchants, a lime-burner (in Dorking), an ironfounder, an
ironmonger, a colourman, a fanlight-maker, and suppliers
of drain-pipes, chimney-pots, laths, plaster, plasterers'
hair, mahogany, and shrubs and ‘potato setts’ for the
enclosure. Ten carters were employed, mainly to cart and
wheel bricks and sand, but Dowley and Tuck also spent
£84 on buying their own carthorses and £42 for two
chaises and harness, these purchases being soon followed
by bills for forage, corn, stable rent and the services of
a farrier. When the first houses began to take shape another
stream of accounts flowed in, from three bricklayers,
eleven carpenters, three plasterers, a sawyer, a stonemason, a plumber, a glass-cutter, a glazier, a painter, a
paper-hanger, a paper-stainer, a measurer (Cornelius Holland) and a scavenger, whose function was presumably to
move the mountains of builders’ rubble which all this
activity must have generated. (ref. 237)
Between May 1823 and June 1826 Dowley and Tuck
paid out some £10,700 in respect of these costs (including
a few items relating to the canal). (ref. 238) At first they raised
the necessary funds by obtaining unsecured loans from
Sarah Gates, a spinster of Lambeth (£790), Thomas Stretton, a druggist of Coleshill, Warwickshire (£500), and
Joseph Dyer, a victualler (£865). (ref. 239) But in July 1824 work
on a few houses was sufficiently far advanced for Lord
Kensington to begin executing leases, on the security of
which Dowley and Tuck were able to borrow much larger
sums. Between that date and April 1826 they or their
nominees were granted leases for twenty-nine houses:
Nos. 2–15, 18–20 (originally two houses, the larger
westerly one being divided into two—19 and 20—in
1832–3), and 38–49 Pembroke Square, and No. 84 Earl's
Court Road (the Pembroke Arms public house, now
renamed the Hansom Cab). (ref. 240)
Four of these leases were granted by direction of
Dowley and Tuck to builders in payment for work done
on the houses then in course of construction, namely of
No. 8 to George Benson of Kensington, painter, whose
accounts show that the cost of building the carcase of this
house was about £350, of No. 4 to Thomas Pike of St.
Marylebone, stonemason, of No. 9 to Thomas Smith of
Chelsea, carpenter, who was also granted an underlease
by Dowley and Tuck of No. 48, and of No. 5 to Tuck's
father, the builder Richard Tuck. (ref. 241)
All the rest of the leases granted by Lord Kensington
until April 1826 were either to Dowley and Tuck, or at
their nomination to investors, who by a long series of not
always comprehensible transactions either lent money on
mortgage or purchased improved ground rents. The most
important of these investors was Thomas Gooch, a retired
watchmaker living at Turnham Green, Chiswick, who at
the time of his death in 1832 owned over seventy leasehold
houses, mostly in Clerkenwell where he had formerly
lived. (ref. 242) Between December 1824 and September 1825 he
lent Dowley and Tuck £3,320, secured in various ways
on Nos. 2, 3, 6, 7, 10, 12–15 and 45–47 Pembroke
Square. (ref. 243) He was also, at Dowley and Tuck's nomination,
the head lessee of the Pembroke Arms, which he sub-let
to the victualler Joseph Dyer at a much larger rent. (ref. 244) Subsequently Dowley and Tuck sub-let the adjoining house,
No. 49 Pembroke Square, to Dyer, probably in part repayment of the unsecured loan of £865 which Dyer had previously made to them. (ref. 245)
The next most important investors in the development
of Pembroke Square were various members of the Hawks
family. In February 1825 Edward Hawks of Camberwell,
gentleman, had at Dowley and Tuck's nomination been
granted a lease of No. 11, (ref. 246) and later in the same year
his kinsmen, Sir Robert Shafto Hawks and John Hawks,
esquire, both of Newcastle upon Tyne, had been involved
in a mortgage of property in Clerkenwell to which Gooch
was also a party. (ref. 247) Sir Robert was head of the engineering
firm of Hawks, Crawshay and Company of Gateshead,
which had prospered greatly during the Napoleonic
Wars. (ref. 248) In November 1825 Dowley and Tuck mortgaged
their lease of Nos. 18–20 for £600 to Sir Robert and John
Hawks, who at once sub-let the houses back to Dowley
and Tuck at an improved ground rent. (ref. 249) Shortly afterwards they advanced another £600 upon the security of
Dowley and Tuck's building agreement of May 1823. (ref. 250)
Their investment in Pembroke Square was evidently
arranged by John Hawks's son, Thomas Longridge
Hawks, an attorney of Gray's Inn, and shows the profits
of provincial manufacturing industry being used to finance
metropolitan building. (ref. 251)
The various mortgages and other devices which Dowley
and Tuck used to raise the capital for the building of Pembroke Square were not sufficient, however, to enable them
to weather the great credit crisis of the autumn of 1825.
In February 1826 (when Joseph and Thomas Brindley's
operations in nearby Warwick Square failed) they resorted
to a City banker for a short-term loan on bills of exchange,
but at the end of June they both went into hiding in
Greenwich ‘to keep out of the way of their Creditors’, and
on 3 July they were declared bankrupt. (ref. 252)
The bankruptcy proceedings had evidently been started
by Sarah Gates, whose unsecured loan of £790 had never
been repaid; (ref. 253) and although Dowley and Tuck's total
debts were much smaller than those of the Brindleys many
of their creditors were to suffer very heavily. Their property was quickly put into the hands of three assignees, the
most important of whom was John Warren, a timber merchant of Whitehall Wharf, (ref. 254) and it was soon found that
their affairs were ‘in a very intricate state’. (ref. 255) The debts
claimed by over fifty creditors amounted to nearly
£10,000, of which the largest were to Lord Kensington
(£1,843 for the supply of bricks) and to William Hoof
(£1,323 for work done on the still uncompleted Kensington Canal). (ref. 256) Dowley and Tuck in turn were owed about
£3,200, of which £2,476 was claimed from the Canal
Company. (ref. 257)
At the time of the bankruptcy only about half a dozen
houses in Pembroke Square were actually occupied, (ref. 36) but
many others were in various stages of construction. In
August 1826 the creditors accordingly authorized the three
assignees to carry out the building agreement of May 1823,
complete the unfinished houses and sell them and all the
ground as yet unbuilt upon. (ref. 258)
The creditor who seems to have fared best in the complex transactions which now ensued was Thomas Gooch,
the retired watchmaker with well-secured interests in
twelve houses in the square. Of these, he had already leased
No. 46 to the stonemason Thomas Pike (probably in consideration of work done on several houses), (ref. 259) and in
September 1826 the assignees ordered seven others to be
sold at auction. All of these were already ‘in the occupation
of tenants of great respectability, at rents producing near
320l a year’, (ref. 260) but only two of the houses found buyers
(for £350 and £375), and in the following month Gooch
was able to buy the equity of redemption in all the eleven
houses in which he still had an interest (Nos. 2, 3, 6, 7,
10, 12–15, 45 and 47) for £250. (ref. 261) During the ensuing
seven years he or his executors sold at least eight of these
houses for prices ranging between £300 and £450, (ref. 262) and
at his death in 1832, when the probate valuation of his
personal estate was £25,000, he also seems to have had
an interest in several other houses in Pembroke Square. (ref. 263)
Sir Robert Shafto Hawks and John Hawks also appear
to have extricated themselves from the situation brought
about by Dowley and Tuck's bankruptcy without pecuniary loss. They, or rather T. L. Hawks, who conducted all
their affairs relating to Pembroke Square, did, however,
have to battle hard to get their money back. At the time
of the bankruptcy the legal formalities relating to their loan
of £600 on a mortgage of Nos. 18–20 do not seem to have
been completed (the houses being certainly unfinished)
and they may not have been able to recover this specific
loan, but by another mortgage for £600 on the building
agreement they were entitled to either the repayment of
this sum or, as T. L. Hawks was soon demanding, the residue of the still undeveloped land covered by the agreement. Lord Kensington wanted the assignees to relinquish
this land to him (as he later successfully managed to do
in similar circumstances in Warwick Square), while leaving them the job of clearing up the muddle in the half-finished square. (ref. 253)
The assignees were unwilling to redeem the mortgage
to the Hawkses, for they were already having to pay out
large sums in wages to the workmen whom they were
employing to complete a number of houses in the
square. (ref. 264) In January 1827 they did, however, offer T. L.
Hawks £550 for his interest in the building agreement,
which he rejected. Shortly afterwards Lord Kensington
riposted with a counter-claim to an equitable mortgage on
the agreement for £1,000 in respect of bricks supplied to
Dowley and Tuck. Faced with this impasse the assignees
decided to wash their hands of the matter, and after obtaining the concurrence of the creditors, announced in April
that they would relinquish all their rights in the building
agreement to either Lord Kensington or the Hawkses. (ref. 265)
Lord Kensington's claim for £1,000 related to the purchase by Dowley of 60,000 bricks which were later used
by John Campbell (a slater who had some years previously
worked in Edwardes Square) in the building of Nos. 1 and
2 Pembroke Villas. (ref. 266) It was probably not a very wellfounded claim, for both Dowley and Campbell disputed
the statements of Lord Kensington's surveyor, William
Cutbush, and claimed that the bricks in question had been
bought from someone else. (ref. 255) At all events Lord Kensington seems to have been the loser in his argument with T. L.
Hawks, for in October 1827 and May 1828 he granted
Hawks (or his nominees) building leases of all the remaining land affected by the building agreement of 1823.
Several tradesmen involved in one way or another in
Pembroke Square also seem to have come through the
crash relatively unscathed. In 1827 John Campbell, the
slater, was granted the head lease of Nos. 1 and 2 Pembroke Villas, which were first occupied in 1828–9, and the
vacant site on which Nos. 3 and 4 were later built. (ref. 267) Nos. 1
and 2, called at first Pembroke Cottages South, form a pair
of two-storey houses with stuccoed façades and were originally semi-detached, but No. 1 is now linked to the terrace
to the north by a late-nineteenth-century extension.
Similarly William Goddard, a wheelwright, received the
head lease of No. 1 Pembroke Square, and Samuel and
Samuel Manton Briggs that of No. 17 by Hawks's direction. (ref. 268) In 1828 the timber merchant John Warren, one
of the assignees in bankruptcy, was (also by Hawks's direction) granted the leases of No. 16 and the site of the
Scarsdale Arms. (ref. 269)
But most of the creditors lost heavily. Their claim for
£2,476 from the Canal Company was, after much contention, settled by the issue of some promissory notes and
shares which realized only £320 when sold a short time
after the canal's opening. (ref. 270) The assignees' costs in employing workmen to finish a number of houses amounted to £1,600, (ref. 271) and after the final dividend was declared
early in 1830 most of the creditors had received only one
shilling and three pence in the pound on the debts due
to them. (ref. 272)
Robert Tuck, one of the co-authors of their misfortunes,
had been the first to take up residence in the square, where
he lived with his family at No. 7 from about May 1825
to May 1826. (ref. 273) In 1828 he was living in Lamb's Conduit
Street, Holborn, and described himself as a gentleman. (ref. 274)
John Dowley, the salaried chief surveyor of the Westminster Commissioners of Sewers, had through his frequent
absences from his office aroused the Commissioners' suspicions some six months before his bankruptcy. (ref. 275)
Immediately after his failure became known he was
declared to have forfeited his position, but he was kept
on temporarily, and when the post was advertised early
in 1827 he was the only applicant. (ref. 276) He was therefore
reappointed and held the post until 1845, when, suffering
from debility and gout, he was superseded as chief
surveyor by one of his own staff (John Phillips). He was,
however, kept on as a consultant surveyor at a salary of
£200 per annum until the demise of the Westminster
Commission of Sewers at the end of 1847. (ref. 277)
Between about October 1827, when he had successfully
asserted his claim to possession of the remaining ground
under the building agreement of 1823, and his own death
in 1829, T. L. Hawks was in charge of the continuation
of the development begun by Dowley and Tuck. By May
1828 Lord Kensington had granted building leases of all
the houses on the north and south sides of Pembroke
Square except Nos. 32A and 33–37, which he now leased
to Hawks (Nos. 32A and 33) and the latter's nominee, William Wade, a fellow lawyer (Nos. 34–37). (ref. 278) Hawks made
arrangements with two builders, John Sims, stonemason,
and William Sparkes, builder, to complete Nos. 32A and
33, and in 1829 his brother and executor, George Hawks
of Gateshead, esquire, sold both houses to Thomas Gooch,
the retired watchmaker, who soon disposed of them, the first occupant of No. 32A, William Toone, esquire, paying
£420 for his house. (ref. 279) At Nos. 34–37 Wade seems to have
provided the funds, and Thomas Steel, a local carpenter,
was granted the sub-lease of No. 36 in 1829, probably in
payment for completing the houses, all of which had been
disposed of by 1831 (ref. 280) It was also under the Hawkses'
auspices that the back gardens of several of the houses on
the south side of Pembroke Square were extended some
fifty feet southwards and provided with rear access from
Pembroke Walk, a cul-de-sac leading off Pembroke Villas.
By the end of 1830 all the houses on the north and south
sides of Pembroke Square (Plates 110b, 111b, fig. 113) had
been completed and occupied, (ref. 36) but Dowley and Tuck had
done much less work on the western range, and building
leases here had not been granted until May 1828. The lessee was T. L. Hawks, to whom at the same time Lord Kensington also leased all the remaining undeveloped land
around the square, within the bounds of the original ‘take’
of May 1823. (ref. 281) Hawks's executor, George Hawks, made
arrangements with the builders Thomas Steel, John Sims
and Roger Spink for the completion of Nos. 24–35A, which
are virtually identical with the north and south ranges, and
they were all occupied by 1835. (ref. 282)
In 1831, meanwhile, George Hawks had sold his
family's interest in all the houses in the western range and
in the remaining unbuilt area for £1,500. (ref. 283) The purchaser
was William Collins, a builder who had been active in the
early 1820s to the east of Earl's Court Road (see page 110).
From 1828 to 1834, when he began to describe himself
as gentleman or esquire, he lived at No. 34 Edwardes
Square, (ref. 36) and it was under his auspices and, after 1860,
those of his window, that the development of the Pembroke
Square area was at last completed.
As happened in Warwick Gardens after the Brindleys'
debacle, this proved to be a lengthy business, housebuilding in the 1830s being in one of its periodic phases
of recession. At first Collins concentrated on the development of the remaining land to the north of the western
side of Pembroke Square, where c. 1835–7 he extended
the western range by the erection of Nos. 22 and 23. Despite their slightly larger size and different window dressings, these houses closely resemble Nos. 24–35A. (ref. 284) In
1839 he built the still larger No. 21, a two-storey, stuccofaced house, first occupied in 1843, which now has a
heightened attic storey. (ref. 285) He was probably also responsible for the adjoining Nos. 1 and 2 Pembroke Cottages,
an attractive pair of two-storey villas with low slate roofs
(Plate 110d), which were first occupied in 1843–4. Their site had been acquired in 1831 by John Warren, the timber
merchant who had been one of Dowley and Tuck's
assignees, from George Hawks as executor of T. L.
Hawks, but Warren had since died. (ref. 286) The similar pair,
Nos. 3 and 4 Pembroke Cottages, which stood on land
which was originally let for the development of Edwardes
Square, were first occupied in 1846 and demolished c. 1932
for the building of Pembroke Court. Collins had acquired
their site in 1831 from the executors of John Robins, an
auctioneer who had been active in Edwardes Square. (ref. 287)
All nineteen houses between No. 4 Pembroke Cottages,
which had a flank frontage on the south side of Edwardes
Square, and No. 35A Pembroke Square belonged to Collins. The frequent occurrence of his name as ratepayer
(sometimes ‘for tenant’) at many of the houses in this range
between 1832 and his death in 1860 suggests that he often
let them on short leases. For much of the period after 1837
he himself lived at No. 23 Pembroke Square. (ref. 36)
Figure 113:
Pembroke Square, 1823–35, site and house plans, elevations, section and detail of balcony ironwork
Collins's remaining undeveloped land had a frontage of
over six hundred feet along the north side of Pembroke
Road, and short return frontages to Pembroke Villas and
the west side of Earl's Court Road. In 1844–6, when the
building cycle was again on the upturn, he granted building leases of Nos. 98–108 (even) Earl's Court Road to his
kinsman Thomas Collins of Newland Terrace, builder,
who erected a range (originally known as Pembroke Terrace) of routine three-storey houses with basements, each
two windows wide and faced with stucco at ground-floor
level. (ref. 288) No. 108 was reconstructed in 1953–4 after war
damage. Further north the site of Nos. 94 and 96 Earl's
Court Road had originally formed part of the extensive
curtilage of the Pembroke Arms, (ref. 289) and these two houses
were built a few years after Nos. 98–108, but the identily
of their builder is not known.
William Collins appears to have himself built Nos. 3 and
4 Pembroke Villas in 1850, having seven years earlier purchased their site, which had originally been leased in 1827
by Lord Kensington to the slater John Campbell. (ref. 290) These
attractive paired houses have three storeys above basements with channelled stucco on the ground floor and simple moulded architraves to the windows of the upper
storeys. The first-floor windows also have ornate iron
window-guards. The adjoining No. 5 Pembroke Villas was
built shortly afterwards on ground belonging to Collions
and was first occupied in 1859. It was originally only two
bays wide, but after an intened private road along the
sourthern boundary of its curtilage was eventually abandoned, a matching third bay was added. (ref. 291)
William Collins's contemporaeous building activities
in Pembroke Road are described below. He died at No. 23
Pembroke Square in 1860, leaving effects valued at over
£12,000 to his windows, Phoebe. (ref. 292) One of the witness of
his will was the local builder Thomas Holland, who shortly
afterwards built Nos. 6 and 7 Pembroke Villas, a mirrored
pair of small houses which have only two main storeys
above a basement but pack in a number of features including large bay windows on the basement and ground floors
and recessed entrances behind a double arch supported
by a Doric column and responding pilasters. They were
first occupied in 1864. (ref. 293)
Further north in the same road, in the short unnamed
strech between Edwardes Square and Pembroke Square,
the Scarsdale Arms, a detached, three-storey public house
faced in stock brick with florid stucco dressings (Plate
110c), was erected in 1866–7 by James Broadhurst, a beer
retailer of Kentish Town. The first tenant was
R. Madworth. (ref. 294)
Phoebe Collins died at No. 22 Pembroke Square in
1876, leaving effects valued at about £25,000—more than
double those of her husband sixteen years previously. (ref. 295)
Notable Residents
Residents in Pembroke Square have included: Thomas
Christopher Hofland, landscape painter, and his wife Barbara Hofland, authoress, 1833–7 (No. 6); John Thorpe,
artist, 1846–52 (No. 18); Robert Lugar, architect and
author of several books of architectural designs, 1851–5
(No. 19); George Brettingham Sowerby the younger, conchologist and artist, 1857–9 (No. 9); Henry Alexander
Bowler, artist, 1863–1903 (No. 21), and Sir Almroth
Edward Wright, bacteriologist, 1920–c. 1942 (No. 6). (ref. 296)
According to his biographer, the dramatist Dion Boucicault moved to Pembroke Square c. 1841 shortly after the
success of his play ‘The London Assurance’, but his name
does not appear in the ratebooks and his residence there
was probably very brief. (ref. 297) In Pembroke Villas Thomas
Fairland, engraver and lithographer, lived at No. 2, 1843–9, and Normal O'Neill, composer, at lived No. 4, 1904–34. (Sir)
William Rothenstein, artist, and Laurence Housman,
writer, lived at No. 1 Pembroke Cottages in 1899–1902
and 1904–19 respectively. (ref. 298)
Pembroke Square Garden
An eighty-nine-year lease of the enclosure in the centre
of Pembroke Square was granted by Lord Kensington
c. 1834, probably to William Collins, in whom it was
vested in 1860. (ref. 299) A building at the east end of the garden
is shown on maps of 1837 and 1843, (ref. 300) and probably originally functioned as a lodge in a similar manner to that
in Edwardes Square. It was indeed for many years known
as ‘The Lodge’ before being numbered firstly No. 60
Earl's Court Road and then No. 80 in 1907. In the late
nineteenth century it was used principally by a succession
of florists and was acquired by Charles Rassell, gardener,
c. 1897. (ref. 301) Rassell was the son of Henry Rassell, a gardener,
who had lived at No. 1 Shaftesbury Terrace (later No. 179
Warwick Road) since c. 1879 and had taken a sub-lease
of some of the garden plots which were provided as part
of the layout of that area of working-class cottages (see
page 285). (ref. 302) In 1903 Rassell undertook alterations to the
house, and its basic appearance today accords with that
date. (ref. 303)
Rassell also acquired the freehold of the square garden,
probably in the same year, when this part of the Edwardes
estate was being sold in lots. (ref. 304) In 1923 he applied to the
London Country Council for permission to build two
houses at the western end of the enclosure, which was
apparently not protected by any covenants restricting
building, but his application was refused as undersirable. (ref. 305)
Shortly afterwards the Prudential Assurance Company
paid £3,000 for the freehold of land to the depth of sixty-nine feet at this end of the square on behalf of the freeholders of the surrounding houses. Rassell retained the
ownership of the remaining 210 feet of the enclosure, but
entered into a covenant not to build on 175 feet of this. (ref. 306)
Today the western end of the square is occupied by a small
formal garden, the middle part by a tennis court, and the
eastern end by Rassell's Nursery.
Later Changes in the Area
Despite some unfortunate alterations to a few of the houses
the outward aspect of the two main ranges of Pembroke
Square—like the very similar ones in Edwardes Square—has not changed markedly. Substantial changes have,
however, taken place on the rear parts of some of the house
plots. Most of the former gardens of the first five houses
on the north side of the square are now covered by No. 74
Earl's Court Road, a three-storey office block which was
erected in 1969 to the designs of Dennis Ball, (ref. 307) while on
the south side the frontage to Earl's Court Road immediately to the south of the Hansom Cab is occupied by a
small block of flats, Nos. 88–92 (even) Earl's Court Road,
which was erected in 1931–2. (ref. 308)
In both Earl's Walk, behind the northern range of the
square, and more particularly in Pembroke Walk on the
south, a number of small studio houses date from the late
nineteenth century onwards. No. 3 Earl's Walk was built
in 1915 to the designs of E. Guy Dawber as a studio for
No. 6 Pembroke Square, (ref. 309) but it is now largely obscured
and in poor condition externally. The complex of studios
at Nos. 23, 25 and 27 Earl's Walk date originally from 1903
(Nos. 25 and 27) and 1912 (No. 23 and the entrance forecourt, for which Sydney Newcombe was the architect) but
have been much altered. (ref. 310) In Pembroke Walk Nos. 2–4
(consec.) have been converted from a late-nineteenth-century builder's works (of Thomas W. Heath and Son),
while the attractive complex at Nos. 6–8 (consec.) was
built as Pembroke Walk Studios c. 1902–3. (ref. 311)
Pear Tree Cottage, which stands behind Nos. 1 and 2
Pembroke Cottages, dates from the 1920s and was probably begun in 1923. (ref. 312)
Artists' studios (now Nos. 2A and 2B Pembroke Road)
were built in the back garden of No. 108 Earl's Court Road
c. 1900. (ref. 313) They are screened from Pembroke Road by a
stuccoed curtain wall surmounted by two small pediments.
The recent redevelopment of Nos. 24–42 (even) Pembroke
Road, which fall within the area originally taken by
Dowley and Tuck, is described on page 275.
Pembroke Gardens and Pembroke
Gardens Close
Pembroke Gardens consists of two short stretches of street
meeting at a right angle. The position of the east-west
arm was determined during the building of Warwick
Gardens in the 1850s, but only a short opening into the
new street was formed then. One house, now No. 35 Pembroke Gardens, was built on the north side by 1860, but
it belonged essentially to the development of Warwick
Gardens and is described on page 266. The remainder of
the street was laid out from 1863 onwards.
The principal undertaker here in the 1860s was Richard
Albion Holliday of Newland Street (now Abingdon Road),
who described himself as a contractor. Two years earlier,
when his address had been Emma Place (now Cope Place)
and his designation that of ‘carman’, he had begun to build
a terrace of eight houses in Newland Street, which were
originally known as Albion Terrace and are now Nos. 53–67 (odd) Abingdon Road. At first the houses he built there
were small, plain and somewhat outdated, but midway
through the terrace he switched to building larger, more
ornamented and more conventional houses for their date.
After this apparently initial foray into the building world,
Holliday moved on to the construction of even larger,
though hardly less conventional, houses in Pembroke
Gardens, and, after briefly taking up residence in a house
there (No. 18), he then progressed further westwards by
December 1868, to the Grove Tavern, Hammersmith. (ref. 314)
In the years 1863–8 Holliday, who was illiterate and signed
all deeds with a mark, seems to have been in charge of
the building of twenty-seven houses in Pembroke Gardens
(Nos. 1–27, of which Nos. 1–12 have been demolished)
and was himself granted leases, or in one instance a sublease, of twenty-five of these. The lessee of the other two
houses was John Seymour, also of Newland Street, a carpenter, (ref. 315) who made the initial application to the
Metropolitan Board of Works to form the north-south arm
of the street, (ref. 316) and was clearly assisting Holliday from
the start.
The initial agreement for building on the east side of
the new street appears to have been made, not with Holliday, however, but with Frederick Blasson Carritt of
Basinghall Street in the City, a solicitor. Carritt was granted the first lease, of No. 1 Pembroke Gardens and a large
plot at its rear (now the site of Pembroke Gardens Close),
in December 1863, and sub-let the smaller site on which
No. 1 was erected to Holliday, while retaining the piece
of ground behind. He was subsequently a party to the
leases of Nos. 2–12 (consec.) on the east side, which were
granted between December 1863 and December 1864. (ref. 317)
The leases of Nos. 13–27 (consec.) were granted directly
to Holliday by Lord Kensington in 1866–8. (ref. 318)
Carritt appears to have been fulfilling the archetypical
role of the solicitor in the Victorian building process, probably providing money himself, but also encouraging clients
to invest their capital in mortgages to Holliday. Even in
the mortgages of Nos. 13–27, where Carritt had not been
a party to the leases, the witnesses to the deeds usually
included one of his clerks. Among the mortgagees were
two dissenting ministers, from Plaistow in Essex and from
Greenwich, a farmer from Bedfordshire, an ‘esquire’ of
Lincolnshire (who had also provided mortgages for Holliday's speculations in Abingdon Road), a widow of
Highbury Crescent, and a gentleman of Peckham. (ref. 319)
In August 1865 Holliday also turned to the London Assurance Corporation for money, applying for a loan of
£6,800 on the security of nine houses, of which seven had
already been let to ‘highly respectable’ tenants at the
(somewhat low sounding) total rental of £455 per annum.
The Corporation agreed to advance £4,000, but when Holliday applied for a further £6,000 on ten more houses in
March 1866, the Corporation, for reasons not specified,
declined his request. (ref. 320)
The houses which Holliday built seem to have found
a ready market, judging from their rapid occupancy rate.
They were good-sized houses with three main storeys over
basements and were arranged mostly in semi-detached
pairs. Nos. 1–12 (now demolished) had larger plots and
more space between each pair, though by the end of the
nineteenth century most of these spaces had been filled
in by one- or two-storey additions at the sides of the
houses. (ref. 321) At the north end of the west side, No. 23 is a
larger double-fronted house attached to its neighbouring
pair on the south, while Nos. 24–27 are terraced houses
with an additional garret storey (Plate 114b). All of the
surviving houses (Nos. 13–27) are fully stuccoed up to
first-floor level and are faced with grey bricks and stucco
dressings in the upper storeys. The paired houses have
flat doorcases with hood moulds and bay windows, while
the terraced houses have projecting Doric porches and
iron-railed balconies but are otherwise flat-fronted.
Nos. 28–30 were not built by Holliday, but by Samuel
Johns, the builder who lived opposite in Garibaldi Villa
(now No. 35). The ground here had originally been let
with the Wesleyan Chapel at the corner of Warwick
Gardens to the chapel's proprietors and was sub-let by
them to Johns in 1870. (ref. 322) Although superficially resembling Holliday's houses, those built by Johns are different
in a number of details, though whether these variations
in a number of details, though whether these variations
were the result of Johns's desire to impose his own
individuality on the houses or his inability to build to
another's façde design is no longer apparent.
Pembroke Lodge (now demolished), a detached house
with an extensive garden which now forms most of the
site of Pembroke Gardens Close, was erected by 1868 on
the remainder of the large plot which had been leased to
Carritt in 1863. The house was probably built by Holliday,
whose other houses in Pembroke Gardens it resembled.
It was purchased for £2,500 in 1909 by Andrew Bonar
Law, the Conservative politician and later Prime Minister,
who lived there until 1917, when he moved to No. 11
Downing Street following his appointment as Chancellor
of the Exchequer in the previous December. Pembroke
Lodge was subsequently used as a convalescent home for
wounded officers. (ref. 323)
Other notable occupants of houses in Pembroke
Gardens included Samuel Smiles, the writer and social
reformer, author of Self-Help, at No. 4 from c. 1876 to
1881 and then at No. 8 from 1881 to his death in 1904;
Oswald Sickert, painter, at No. 12 from 1877 to his death
in 1885; and Professor John William Mackail, the classical
scholar, poet and critic, who lived at No. 6 for the last
forty-seven years of his life from 1898 to 1945. (ref. 324) Mackail's
daughter, the novelist Angela Thirkell, also lived at No. 6
for much of her life and did not finally leave it until 1947. (ref. 325)
Her son, Colin Maclnnes, recalled the house as ‘one of
those bleak, inconvenient Roman piles … its rooms were
all too high for their width, its staircase too narrow for
two persons to pass by, and its plumbing recalled that of
a provincial railway hotel’. (ref. 326)
During the war of 1939–45 Nos. 8–12 Pembroke
Gardens and nearby houses in Pembroke Road were
destroyed or severely damaged by bombing. In 1949 the
Prudential Assurance Company, which owned the free-hold of the site, announced plans to redevelop the whole
of the east side of Pembroke Gardens together with the
west side of Pembroke Square and Villas, and the north
side of Pembroke Road between those streets. (ref. 327) It proposed to proceed in stages beginning with the replacement
of the war-damaged houses, for which a building licence
was granted in December 1951. Seven new houses, Nos. 8–12 Pembroke Gardens and 46–48 Pembroke Road, were
erected with garages sunk slightly below street level and
two storeys above. Of a plain, simple appearance, they are
faced with white-painted Flettons and have flat roofs, both
items being largely dictated by the need to keep within
specified cost limits at that date. They were designed by
the Prudential's Chief Architect, F. F. J. H. Doyle, the
architect in charge of the works being L. W. Hall, and the
builders Sir Robert McAlpine and Sons. (ref. 328)
The next stage took place in 1957–9 when Pembroke
Lodge was demolished and Nos. 1–18 Pembroke Gardens
Close were built in its former grounds. These are substantial two-storey detached or semi-detached neo-Georgian
houses with red-brick façades, segmental-headed doorcases and wooden dentilled cornices. They were also
designed by Doyle, with K. C. Wintle as architect in
charge. No. 44 Pembroke Road was rebuilt at this time
in a matching style to Nos. 46 and 48. Nos. 24–42 (even)
Pembroke Road were erected in 1961–3 to Wintle's
designs and differ from Nos. 44–48 in having three storeys
faced with multi-coloured stock bricks above basement
garages. (ref. 329)
In 1966–8 Nos. 1–7 Pembroke Gardens were replaced
by twelve houses of similar dimensions to Nos. 8–12
though faced with multi-coloured bricks and with large
bow windows at first-floor level (Plate 114c). The architect
was L. H. Nixon of the Prudential's Architect's Department. Finally, in 1970–2, Nos. 19–32 Pembroke Gardens
Close were built on ground taken from the back gardens
of houses on the west side of Pembroke Square and Pembroke Villas. These houses, also designed by Nixon, are
plainer than their earlier counterparts on the opposite side
of Pembroke Gardens Close and have prominent garages
in front. (ref. 330) The proposed redevelopment of houses in
Pembroke Square and Villas did not take place.
Nos. 31–34 Pembroke Gardens, which were built on the
former site of the Wesleyan Chapel at the corner of
Warwick Gardens, are described on page 267.
Figure 114:
Pembroke Studios, site plan, and typical studio plan and elevation. C. F. Kearley, builder, 1890–1
Pembroke Studios
This attractive complex of small studio houses was erected
in 1890–1. It Comprises two ranges of six gabled studios,
built of stock bricks with red-brick dressings, which face
on to a secluded, planted enclosure (fig. 114). This is
screened from the street by an elaborate arched entrance
(fig. 115) which is set back a short distance from the north
side of Pembroke Gardens behind another planted area.
The builder was Charles Frederick Kearley, but the identity of the architect is not known. (ref. 331)
Pembroke Road Area
Pembroke Road was projected as early as the 1820s, (ref. 332) its
course effectively determined in 1823 by the southern
boundary of the land made available to Dowley and Tuck
for the laying out of Pembroke Square and its surrounding
area. Yet such was the protracted nature of that development that it was not until the 1840 that any building took
place along the street, and then on the south side rather
than the north. And for many years afterwards the buildings on the south side of the street, with one or twominor
exceptions, marked the southernmost limit of building
operations on the Edwardes estate. Beyond lay the market
gardens of Karl's Court Farm, and it was not until the
construction of the Metroploitan District Railway in
1865–8 that this productive land was surrendered to the
speculative builder.
Pembroke Road, South Side
The developer of the whole of the south side of Pembroke
Road was Stephen Bird, the prominent Kensington
builder and brickmaker, (ref. 333) who already held much land
hereanouts on short tenancies for brickmaking, excavating
gravel, or for farming. (ref. 334) From the early 1840s onwards
Bird gradually began to line the south side of the road
with paired villas, the first of them being occupied in
1844. (ref. 36) In 1840, when sixteen houses, originally Nos. 1–16
Pembroke Road but renumbered in 1866 as 1–31 (odd),
were completed or in course of building. Bird was granted
a ninety-three-year lease by Lord Kensington of all of the
south side of the street between Earl's Court Road and
Warwick Road with the exception of one house plot, that
of No. 8 (later No. 15), which was leased directly to Bird's
son-in-law, Thomas Allen Hockley. (ref. 335) Besides the houses
in Pembroke Road, Bird had also erected another house
and ancillary buildings further to the west on the ground
leased to him, facing Warwick Road a little to the south
of the projected junction of the two roads. This was
occupied from 1848 to 1866 by Mrs. Hannah Johnson as
the Warwick Farm Dairy. (ref. 336)
Figure 115:
Pembroke Studios, elevation of entrance. C. F. Kearley, builder, 1890–1
After obtaining his lease Bird built three more houses,
Nos. 17–19, later Nos. 33–37 (odd), consisting of another
pair of villas and a detached house at the corner of a new
fifty-foot-wide roadway (now called Cromwell Crescent)
which led out of Pembroke Road. Of these nineteen houses
which were erected by Bird only three, Nos. 29–33 (odd),
still survive. Their varied appearance is in part due to later
alterations, but even originally Bird's houses were by no
means uniform, some having two main storeys and others
three and varying in width. They were all stuccoed, however, mostly with Doric doorcases and prominent bandcourses dividing the storeys.
Nos. 1–27 (odd) Pembroke Road were replaced by two
six-storey blocks of flats, Chatsworth Court and the smaller Marlborough Court, both of which were designed by
Murrell and Pigott and erected in 1934–5 and 1937–8
respectively. The same architects were also responsible for
the west-facing terrace of eight three-storey houses at
Nos. 10–17 (consec.) Cromwell Crescent, which were
erected in 1936–7 in place of Nos. 35 and 37 Pembroke
Road. The houses are in a typical 1930s idiorn with brown-brick façades, composition balconies and step, green-pantiled roofs. (ref. 337)
Between the roadway now called Cromwell Crescent
and Warwick Road, a distance of some five hundred feet,
the ground on the south side of Pembroke Road was used
for the construcation of a factory for the celebrated French
piano and harp manufacturers, Messrs. S. and P. Erard
(fig. 116). The firm, which had been founded in 1780 in
Paris by Sébastien Erard, had had a branch in London
since at least 1794. This was situated at No. 18 Great
Marlborough Street in the parish of St. James, Westminster, and in the early nineteenth century there was also a
workshop in Little Portland Street, St. Marylebone. (ref. 338)
After Sebastien's death in 1831 the business was conducted by his nephew, Pierre Erard.
The only Council Medal to be awarded for pianos in
the Great Exhibition of 1851 went to and Erard. (ref. 339) While
the decision to erect a factory in Kensington must have
been taken before this triumph, the events were not unconnected, as the firm's position as the leading piano manufacturer in the world at that date (ref. 340) was reflected both in its
success at the Exhibition and in the evident need to expand
production in England.
Figure 116:
Erards piano factory, Pembroke Road, 1851, site plan, and elevation, plan, section looking NE and details of surviving
building (cross-hatched on site plan)
The factory was under construction by March 1851 (ref. 341)
and probably came into production towards the end of that
year. (ref. 36) On 25 December 1851 Stephen Bird, who already
held the ground under the lease from Lord Kensington
mentioned above and who may well have built the
premises, granted a sub-lease of the site to Pierre Erard. (ref. 342)
The layout of the factory appears to have been based
closely on that of the firm's manufactory in the Rue de
Flandre in Paris, and from the evidence of the surviving
fragment of the buildings, its appearance was also very
similar. (ref. 343) The principal buildings were two four-storey
blocks, each some 140 feet in length and divided into nine
bays with wide segmental-headed small-paned windows.
These blocks (of which one still survives though shortened
by a bay) were at the eastern end of the site, parallel to
each other and to Pembroke Road. To the west, on each
side of a long driveway, were a number of other structures
which, on the evidence of the French factory, were probably used principally for the storage and seasoning of timber. Initially the factory occupied an area of about two
acres, the wide spaces between buildings being dictated
by the need to take especial precautions against the spread
of fire in an establishment where so much of the material
stored and used was highly combustible.
The evidence provided by the surviving part of the
northern range shows that the prevention of the spread
of fire also formed a major consideration in the internal
planning of the building. Here each storey is basically
divided into three compartments by two thick brick lateral
walls, with further lath-and-plaster partitioning on some
floors. Communication between the compartments is
through a single opening in the centre of each internal wall
furnished with a double set of thick iron doors. Within
each compartment the wide floor-span was carried on an
intricate arrangement of timber beams supported by castiron columns (intermediate wooden posts having been
added later when the building was put to other uses). Only
one narrow staircase appears to have been provided for
the whole block. Constructed of stone, it is confined within
brick walls, and access to each floor is through a sliding
iron door.
In 1855, according to its own publicity, Erards produced annually over 1,000 pianos and harps at its Kensington
factory and employed some 300 workers (including the
staff of its showrooms in Great Marlborough Street). (ref. 344)
Pierre Erard died in that year and the direction of the business passed to his widow.
The factory was enlarged in 1859 when a further one
and a half acres immediately to the south of the main site
were added to its grounds. This land, which had originally
been reserved for a continuation of the mews now called
Logan Place, was leased directly by Lord Kensington for
eighty-three years to George John and Charles James
Bruzaud of Great Marlborough Street, harp and pianoforte manufacturers. (ref. 345) George John Bruzaud was the head
of the London branch of Erards, and his brother Charles
James, who lived in the detached house at No. 37 Pembroke Road, was apparently the manager of its Kensington
factory. (ref. 346) In about 1866 the site of the former dairy in
Warwick Road was also added, and at its greatest extent
the factory occupied some four acres of land (see site plan
in fig. 116).
By the end of the 1870s, however, a period of contraction had set in. The former dairy premises were disposed
of in 1877 to the Kensington Vestry to be used as stables
in connection with the Vestry's nearby depot, and in the
census of 1881 the factory was listed as having only 127
employees. (ref. 347) Finally in 1890 the premises were closed
down and the materials and machinery on the site were
sold at auction. (ref. 348) The ostensible reason for the closure
was the recent death of Madame Erard (late in 1889), (ref. 340)
but the firm had, in fact, been in decline for some years.
It was unwilling to adopt modern technological innovations and was increasingly unable to compete with cheaper
products, particularly from Germany. There was also an
element of rationalization in its decision to close its
London factory, where wages were comparatively high,
and concentrate production in Paris. (ref. 350) At that time Erards
planned to close down their whole establishment in
London, but in the following year the business came under
new management and a decision was taken to rebuild the
showrooms in Great Marlborough Street and provide a
concert hall there on the model of the Salle Erard in Paris.
This was completed by 1894, (ref. 351) but the manufacture of
pianos continued to be restricted to the Paris works.
Over the next few years, through a complicated series
of assignments and sub-leases, the site of the factory was
divided between the Kensington Vestry, which took the
north-western part as an addition to its depot, John Barker
and Company, which took the eastern part of the site with
its two substantial buildings for warehouses, Bishop and
Sons, the furniture removers, who also used the southwestern part for depositories, and the cheesemonger and
property developer, Jubal Webb, who proposed to use the
southern part of the frontage to Cromwell Crescent for
speculative building. (ref. 352) Barkers soon devised schemes for
the better utilization of their ground, and a number of
buildings were added to the designs of Philip E. Pilditch.
In 1902–3 a new five-storey depository was built to link
the western ends of the two existing blocks and a red-brick
wall was erected on the Pembroke Road frontage.
The most ambitious plans, however, were for the frontage to Cromwell Crescent, where additional land was
acquired from Jubal Webb in 1902. Here in 1903–4 the
range of flats called Warwick Mansions was erected by
Barkers' Building Department to Pilditch's designs. On
the northern part of the site, which had only a very shallow
depth, the company had wanted to extend the depositories
and give them the appearance of residences, but the free-holder, Lord Iveagh, who had purchased this part of Lord
Kensington's estate late in 1902, refused his consent, and
the range of flats was extended almost to the corner with
Pembroke Road, where it was furnished with a crowning
cupola. A bay of the former piano factory was demolished
to give additional depth to the flats. (ref. 353) Pilditch's eclectic
design for Warwick Mansions, with its plentiful use of red
brick and terracotta and some surprising elements like
half-timbering and pebbledash beneath the small triangular gables, is an ebullient example of the late Domestic
Revival style (Plate 115b).
Barkers sold Warwick Mansions to a property company
in 1929, (ref. 354) and in 1975 they also gave up their depositories.
Kensington and Chelsea Borough Council, then about to
take possession of the large new Central Depot which had
replaced the old depots on both the north and south sides
of Pembroke Road (see page 284), decided to purchase the
depositories for even more accommodation. (ref. 355) A number
of alterations have since been made including the demolition of the southern block of the former Erards' factory
buildings.
Pembroke Road, North Side
On the north side of Pembroke Road, the frontage for some
six hundred feet westwards of Earl's Court Road had
formed the southern boundary of Dowley and Tuck's
‘take’ of 1823 for the formation of Pembroke Square (see
page 268). In 1831 the undeveloped portions of this parcel
of land were purchased by William Collins (see page 271),
but it was not until 1853 that he began to develop the Pembroke Road frontage. Even after such a long wait he could
hardly have chosen a more unfortunate time to begin
operations — just when the building industry in London
was about to enter a four-year period of decline.
In January 1853 Collins concluded an agreement with
Francis John Attfield of Kensington, builder, for the erection of twelve houses between Earl's Court Road and Pembroke Villas in three groups of four. The building of the
first of these ranges began in August 1853, (ref. 356) not by Attfield, however, but by Barnabas Jennings and William
Stephenson, formerly of Chelsea, but now with local
addresses, who had been building on the east side of Earl's
Court Road and in nearby streets in 1852–3 (see page 229).
In October Attfield assigned the benefit of his building
agreement for £125 to Jennings and Stephenson, who also
paid Collins £100 for agreeing to the transfer. (ref. 357) In 1854
Collins granted leases of the four houses, by the direction
of Jennings and Stephenson, to several builders' merchants. (ref. 358) the rest of the building agreement was not
carried out and was presumably surrendered. The houses
erected by Jennings and Stephenson, which were originally called Belmont Villas and are now Nos. 2–8 (even)
Pembroke Road, are unusual in appearance with wide
stuccoed door surrounds and eared architraves to the
upper-storey windows, but are not without a rudimentary
distinction (Plate 111a). According to the building agreement, their elevations had to be approved by Collins,
whose surveyor was a Mr. Blofield, probably the William
Blofield of West Brompton, who, as a surveyor, had been
involved in the building of houses in Addison Road, North
Kensington, a short time before. (ref. 359)
(fn. a)
Collins died in 1860, and one of the witnesses to his
will was the local builder Thomas Holland, and it was to
Holland's nominees that Collins's widow, Phoebe, granted
building leases of Nos. 14–28 (even) Pembroke Road in
1861–3. (ref. 360) The leases of the other half-dozen houses which
were erected on her land in Pembroke Road have not been
found, but Holland was almost certainly involved there
too. Nos. 10–12 and 14–16 are conventional stucco
fronted paired houses of three main storeys with bay
windows on the ground floor, and Nos. 18–22 form a similar trio. To the west of Pembroke Villas Nos. 24–42
(even), now demolished, were built under phoebe Collins's
auspices, probably by Holland, and were similar houses
to Nos. 10–22, though faced with grey brick and stucco
dressings. Nos. 44–48 (even) were stock-brick houses erected under building leases granted directly by Lord Kensington in 1862 to Stephen Cooper of Portland Place,
Hammersmith, builder, and John Seymour of Newland
Street (now Abingdon Road), carpenter. (ref. 361) The latter was
also involved at that time in nearby building operations
in Pembroke Gardens. Nos. 46 and 48 were demolished
after being severely damaged by bombing during the war
of 1939–45, and over several years the remaining houses
between Pembroke Gardens and Pembroke Villas were
rebuilt by the Prudential Assurance Company as part of
a redevelopment scheme for the area which is described
on page 275.
To the west of Pembroke Gardens, Nos. 50–76 (even)
Pembroke Road, a range of houses with three stucco-faced
storeys above ground-floor shops, were erected by the
builder James Hall, to whom Lord Kensington granted
building leases in 1859. (ref. 362) Hall was also at that time building houses in Warwick Gardens at the back of this range.
The Kensington Arms, a large Italianate public house at
the corner with Warwick Road, and No. 82 Pembroke
Road, a narrow house and shop on the east side of the
public house (Plate 113a), were erected under building
leases granted to James and Samuel Williams of Shepherd's
Bush, contractors, in 1852 and 1854 respectively. (ref. 363)
Another house built by the Williamses at approximately
the same time (No. 80 Pembroke Road) has been demolished. Originally the space between Nos.76 and 80 formed
the entrance to the depot of the Kensington Vestry, which
was first established on the triangular site between the
backs of houses in Warwick Road, Warwick Gardens and
Pembroke Road in 1863 and is described more fully on
page 283. In 1864 another house (No. 78) was built on
the frontage to Pembroke Road as an office and residence for the foreman of the depot staff. (ref. 364) Both Nos. 78 and
80 were demolished about 1972 for the rebuilding of the
depot.
Logan Place
Logan Place was originally formed in the 1840s as an
unnamed mews at the rear of the houses on the south side
of Pembroke Road, but for many years very few buildings
of any kind were erected along its length. The name Logan
Mews (which is of unknown derivation) was first adopted
in 1876 for the small group of stables and coach-houses
on the south side of the street towards its western end.
These were erected in that year by the builder Thomas
Huggett to serve his nearby developments in Cromwell
Crescent and West Cromwell Road. (ref. 365) The street itself was
not, however, named until 1891, when a depot for the
Army and Navy Co-operative Auxiliary Supply was erected further to the east. The remaining frontage on the
south side was gradually filled up over the next two
decades with studios, a private house and a club-house
and chambers. Much rebuilding has taken place in recent
years, partly as a result of damage sustained during the
war of 1939–45.
At the south-eastern corner with Earl's Court Road two
brick-faced blocks of flats, Courtleigh House (No. 126
Earl's Court Road) and No. 13 Logan Place, have been
erected in place of a semi-detached pair of houses which
faced Earl's Court Road. These had been built under
leases granted in 1858 to John Newton and James Smith,
contractors, (ref. 366) and were originally called Weardale Villas;
they were later numbered 84 and 86 Earl's Court Road
and most recently as 124 and 126 Earl's Court Road.
Courtleigh House, which is seven storeys high, was
designed by Stone, Toms and Partners and erected in
1968–9. (ref. 367) No. 13 Logan Place, which has six floors of flats
raised on piers above a ground-floor lobby and parking
bays, was designed by David Landaw and Partners and
begun in 1970. In conjunction with the latter five low split
level mews houses, Nos. 10, 10a, 11, 11a and 12 Logan
Place, were erected to the designs of the same architects
and using the same dark multi-coloured bricks with recessed pointing. (ref. 367) To the west of these houses another seven
split-level houses faced with virtually identical, brickwork
and of similar height have been erected as an entirely
separate development to the designs of Cusdin Burden and
Howitt. Numbered 9A–G Logan Place, these houses were
completed in 1980 and given an Environmental Award by
Kensington and Chelsea Borough Council in 1981. (ref. 368)
The numbers 3–8 Logan Place are assigned to one
building of 1912, a stock-brick block of three main storeys
and a tall attic, its otherwise, plain façade relieved by two
large bracketed wooden doorcases. The architect was
Gilbert H. Jenkins of Romaine Walker and Jenkins and
the builders John Marsland and Sons. (ref. 369) The building
originally incorporated a club-house, studios and flats.
The studios which stood to the west of Nos. 3–8 were
substantially rebuilt behind their facades in 1961–3 to
houses a small experimental studio theatre for the London
Academy of Music and Dramatic Art. The design of the
scheme was the result of a collaboration between the actor
producer Michael Warre, the stage designer John Terry,
and the architect R. W. Hurst of Humphrys Hurst. The
theatre is now called the Macowan Theatre after Michael
MacOwan, the Principal of LAMDA and the inspiration
behind the project. (ref. 370)
Garden Lodge, an irregularly shaped neo-Georgian
house standing behind a high brick wall to the west of
Logan Mews, was built in 1908–9 for the painter Cecil
Rea and his wife, the sculptress Constance Halford. It is
an imposing building in which a tall pedimented studio
wing with a large bay window on the ground floor has been
grafted on to a conventional two-storey neo-Georgian
house (Plate 116a). Among the features of its grounds is
an open loggia on the inside of the wall to Logan Place.
Rea's architect was the obscure Ernest William Marshall
(1868–1937) who designed No. 20 South End (see page
54), a maternity hospital in Commercial Road and several
small houses, chiefly in Surrey. The builders were
M. Calnan and Son of Commercial Road. Rea lived at
Garden Lodge until his death in 1935, and his widow continued to reside there until 1938. Latterly the house was
occupied by Peter Wilson, the Chairman of Sotheby's. (ref. 371)