Albion House

Albion House is an office building constructed between 1896 and 1898 by architects Norman Shaw and J. Francis Doyle for the White Star Shipping Line. The building features a symmetrical design with six storeys of varying heights and attics, comprising five bays facing James Street and three bays facing The Strand. The basement and ground floor are made of ashlar stone with rusticated dressings, while the upper storeys are brick banded with stone.

The entrance is round-arched and concave, featuring a keystone and rusticated columns, topped with a broken pediment that includes a window and an iron balcony in the tympanum. The windows below the brickwork are sash windows with glazing bars, while those above are mostly casements. The second-floor windows have iron balconies and are adorned with moulded architraves, triple keystones, and cornices. The two upper floors feature paired windows.

The building includes an angle turret, two turrets, and a gable on the Strand facade, with corner turrets topped with a cupola and finials flanking a large triangular gable that was rebuilt after sustaining war damage. There are large banded chimney stacks. A recessed porch behind cast iron gates continues the rustication theme and features a coffered ceiling. Albion House is a dramatic and influential example of Shaw's polychromatic architectural style.