Farringdon London Regional Transport Underground Station

The former Farringdon and High Holborn Station, now a station shared by London Underground and British Rail, dates from 1865 with a front building constructed in 1922 by Charles Walter Clark. It is located on Cowcross Street and includes the buildings at numbers 36-38 and 40-42.

The front building, facing Cowcross Street, is largely symmetrical and constructed of brick faced with white faience and granite dressings, with some areas of exposed white and yellow brick. It features a central three-bay section with an entrance framed by a flat-arched opening with a segmental moulding, flanked by two narrower segmental-arched openings. Single-storey shop wings project forward on either side, each containing three shops and slightly overlapping the central section. The shops have curved corners and are divided by panelled pilasters supporting an entablature and blocking course. The upper windows are flat-arched with moulded architraves, and quoins are present on the centrepiece and outer corners. Faience lettering adorns the fascia, topped with a mutule cornice and stepped blocking course. A return entrance is found on Turnmill Street, featuring a granite architrave and flat-arched windows with keystones. Further along, six smaller flat-arched windows alternate with panels on the first floor. Remnants of the original 1865 station are visible in three bays with round-arched windows under keystones.

Inside, there are three platforms covered by two shallow segmental-arched, trussed and glazed roofs. The outer walls are of yellow brick in English bond, articulated by pilasters with two blank arches between. Eleven bays are on the west side, and ten on the east, each containing round-arched and segmental openings. Metal columns with geometrical detailing at the capitals support the roofs, along with decorative metal brackets. The front building spans the tracks via two segmental-arched bridges detailed in black brick.

The station’s historical significance lies in its role as the original terminus of the Metropolitan Railway, the world’s first underground railway, which initially connected it to Paddington.