Royal Hotel

The Royal Hotel is a hotel that opened in 1840, with its facade and large rear extensions completed in 1877 by JB Pearce. It is constructed of stuccoed red brick and features a slate roof.

The exterior consists of four storeys, with five three-storey canted window bays and an additional bay to the right. The ground floor has French doors, while the centre features a rusticated square entrance porch with a pulvinated frieze and a plain cornice. The first-floor bay windows are adorned with cast-iron balcony railings supported by scrolled and pierced brackets, and there are French windows. The second and third floors have replaced sash windows without glazing bars. The entrance bay is topped with a modillion eaves cornice beneath a hipped roof, and there are stacks on the rear and side slopes. The rear wing extends west along Waterloo Road and includes six full-height canted bays, along with a rusticated central entrance that is now blocked. The ground floor has two-over-two unhorned sashes, while all windows above are late 20th-century replacements.

Inside, a large internal courtyard was created when the rear ranges were added, absorbing a previously external winter garden. The cast-iron columns with pierced spandrels remain, abutting the former rear wall of the original 1840 building, now part of the interior. The hotel features an open-well staircase with turned balusters and newels topped with ball finials.

Historically, Charles Dickens stayed at the Royal Hotel from 1848 to 1849 while writing "David Copperfield" and met James Sharman, the keeper of Nelson's Column, who is believed to have inspired the character of Ham Peggotty.