Regency Lodge

Regency Lodge is a flats and shops development on Finchley Road, Swiss Cottage, built in 1937–8. It was designed by Robert Atkinson and A.F.B. Anderson and is constructed in brown and sandy buff bricks with artificial stone bands and dressings on a steel frame. The building has flat roofs and steel casement windows, though a few windows were replaced in the late 20th century. It is a Moderne style development.

The building comprises a courtyard layout of nine linked blocks, each six storeys high, with a narrow entrance at the centre of the south side. Individual lift and staircase services serve groups of flats to minimise corridor lengths, and separate trades' stairs and lifts are provided, characteristic of the period. Beneath the courtyard and the south range is a large underground parking garage accommodating 100 cars with 15 lock-ups, accessed by ramps from Finchley Road and Avenue Road.

The exterior displays the horizontal emphasis characteristic of the Moderne style through artificial stone bands at window head and cill levels. Bold semi-circular bays feature at the block ends of the south range, and many casement bays have curved corners. Two linked curved bays form the main central feature above the courtyard entrance. The staircases are expressed by large vertical windows flanked by artificial stone fins. The top storey is treated as an attic with windows set in individual artificial stone surrounds rather than banded. Around the building are bas-relief panels made by the Birmingham Guild, depicting the trades employed in the building. The shops have been much altered in the 20th century with modern shop fronts, but the overall planning interest of the scheme is maintained through the curved corner and flat single storey roofs. The north elevation to the rear is utilitarian.

The interior, not inspected in detail, contains flats ranging from two to six rooms, with the larger flats having divisible living rooms.

Regency Lodge occupies the trapezoidal site at the south end of the Swiss Cottage triangle, redeveloped in the 1930s alongside the Odeon Cinema site immediately to the north. Its location near Swiss Cottage Underground Station, whose services were expanded during the 1930s, places it within the context of inter-war transport developments and contemporary residential preferences for quality, stylish flatted accommodation close to central London.

The building is listed as a carefully designed scheme of inter-war flats with parade of shops and underground garage by the notable early 20th-century architect Robert Atkinson. The Moderne development, with its characteristic horizontal emphasis suggesting speed along this arterial route, effectively fills the trapezoidal site. It is well detailed, with bas-relief panels of building trades and significant planning interest, and compares with the best commercial flats of its date.