XLVII—SCALA STREET

(Formerly Pitt Street)

The greater part of Scala Street on the north side is now occupied by the Scala Theatre, but its predecessor lay wholly in Tottenham Street and allowed an unbroken line of houses on this as well as the south side of the street. The numbering of the houses seems to have been unchanged and those remaining after the rebuilding of the theatre and the destruction of the west end of the south side by bombs bear the same numbers as shown on Tompson's plan of the parish (1796–1804). The numbers start with No. 1 (formerly 'No. 86 John Street') at the east end of the north side and return along the south, finishing at the same end with No. 25 (formerly 'No. 87 John Street').

The original houses were three storeys in height, of varying frontages but finished with a plain parapet and mansard roof with dormer windows to the attics. They each had entrances flanked by pilasters with brackets supporting a pedimental hood over a semi-circular arch with key block and glazed fanlight. (Plate 10.) The remaining houses are Nos. 1 to 3 (north side) and Nos. 16 to 19 and 21 to 23 (south side), the pedimental door-cases surviving at Nos. 1, 2, 3, 18 and 21. No. 20 has been rebuilt. Nos. 21 and 22 have had an additional storey.

A reference to the family occupying No. 25 has already been given in connection with the Scientific and Literary Institution in Whitfield Street. (See p. 33.)