LXXI—UPPER WOBURN PLACE, ENDSLEIGH GARDENS, ENDSLEIGH STREET, ENDSLEIGH PLACE AND TAVITON STREET
The west side of Upper Woburn Place is part of the development
commenced by Cubitt in Tavistock and Gordon Squares, and building was
continued westward of this until the whole area north of the squares was
occupied. The general design was adhered to and the five houses, comprising
the Cora Hotel, in Upper Woburn Place (Plates 52 and 53) show only minor
variations. Here the order is Corinthian (known as the Tivoli order) with the
centre house having four columns and the house on each side four pilasters.
The windows on the first floor of the end houses have cornices on brackets,
and the windows of the ground floor are arched.
North of this stands the end of a long block of nine houses on the
south side of Endsleigh Gardens. The flank to Upper Woburn Place is well
designed, with four widely-spaced Corinthian pilasters in addition to those at
the angles. A porch, with the entrance flanked by twin pilasters, is centrally
placed, and the side windows on the first floor have balconies. This building
was formerly connected with the five houses lower down the street by a
ground-storey annexe, but this has since been built up the full four storeys,
with some damage to the composition.
The front to Endsleigh Gardens shows some further variations
(Plate 54). The centre block with four Corinthian columns is flanked on
each side by a section with two pilasters, and with three-light windows on
all but the first floor which has a pair of french windows. This scheme is
repeated at the extremities of the block where they are enclosed on the first and
second floors by two pairs of pilasters. Between the centre and the wings, the
middle window has a pediment on brackets and two others a cornice and
brackets. The division into houses does not correspond with the architectural
parts, a fact betrayed by unexpected gaps in the first-floor balconies. The
rusticated stucco is restricted here, as before, to the sections furnished with
columns or pilasters.
The west end of this block, facing Endsleigh Street, repeats the east
end facing Upper Woburn Place, except that some of the windows are blank
panels, and the porch has the addition of a balustrade to its parapet.
Much the same treatment continues along Endsleigh Street, except
that there is a return to the single blocks of tetrastyle pilasters with rather
smaller capitals (Plate 54).
Endsleigh Place, formerly Gordon Place, (north side) is on the same
lines. Out of seven houses, only those at the ends have pilasters. The centre
house projects forward but is marked only by architraves to the windows of
the upper floors and arched heads to those on the ground floor. Sections of
entablature are placed over the first-floor windows. The end of the block
towards Taviton Street has a porch and a single window on the first and
third floors, between a pair of pilasters. The position of the second-floor
window is taken by a large panel of ornament (Plate 55).
The houses in Taviton Street, by omitting the pilaster treatment
altogether, mark a declension in design. The long entablature between the
second and third floors is rendered meaningless, and the use of heavy architraves to all the windows in the middle storeys is not fortunate.
Inhabitants: Upper Woburn Place. West Side
|
| No. 6. | 1830–1837, William Essex (1784?–1869), enamel painter to Princess Augusta,
Queen Victoria and the Prince Consort. |
| No. 12. | (formerly No. 12A.) 1854–1856, Herbert Brown (1815–1882), barrister and writer
on law. He was called to the bar at the Inner Temple, 1840 and his Legal Maxims
became an established text-book. He also wrote two novels. |
Inhabitants: Endsleigh Gardens
|
| See Euston Square (pp. 116, 117). The south side was renumbered in Endsleigh
Gardens in 1879. |
Inhabitants: Endsleigh Street
|
| No. 1. | 1848–1855, Sir William Atherton(1806–1864), lawyer. Q.C. 1852; Standing Counsel
to the Admiralty, 1855–9; Solicitor-General, 1859 and Attorney-General, 1861.
Liberal M.P. for Durham. |
| No. 10. | 1839–1853, Sir Charles John Crompton (1797–1865), barrister, Inner Temple, 1821.
Justice of the Queen's Bench, 1852. |
| No. 11. | 1864–1876, Rev. T. V. Povah. |
| No. 21. | 1841–1862, Sir John Mellor (1809–1887), judge. Barrister, Inner Temple, 1833.
Q.C. Recorder of Warwick and Leicester. Justice of the Queen's Bench, 1861. M.P.
for Great Yarmouth and Nottingham. He tried the Fenians at Manchester (1867)
and wrote a life of Selden. 1891–1902, Rev. John Wogan Festing, vicar of Christ
Church, Albany Street, 1878–1890; rural dean of St. Pancras, 1887, and prebendary
of St. Pauls, 1888. He became bishop of St. Albans in 1890 and died in Endsleigh
Street, unmarried. |
Inhabitants: Endsleigh Place
|
| No. 5. | 1856–1860, Alexander Pulling(1813–1895), Serjeant-at-law. Barrister, Inner Temple
1843. He was one of the last surviving members of the Ancient Order of Serjeants-atlaw and wrote The Order of the Coif and other legal works. |
| No. 6. | 1884–1885, Rev. John Lindsay. |
| No. 7. | 1888–1893, Rev. G. J. Blomfield, father of Sir Reginald Blomfield. |
Inhabitants: Taviton Street
|
| No. 6. | 1853, Rev. Jasper Peck. |
| No. 8. | 1888–1902, Hugh Price Hughes (1847–1902), methodist divine. He was leader of the
"forward" party in methodism and edited the Methodist Times, started in 1885. He
wrote several works. |
| No. 10. | 1893–1900, Rev. William Tundall. |
| No. 17. | 1866–1877, The Dowager Viscountess Sidmouth. She was Mary, eldest daughter of
Rev. John Young, rector of Thorpe Malsor, Northants and married William Leonard
Addington, second Viscount Sidmouth, in 1820. |
| No. 20. | 1862–1866, Rev. J. Fearnley. |
| No. 24. | 1883–1885, Rev. James Mathew Roberton. |