1 Chelsea Embankment (Shelley House) with associated railings

A town house built in 1912 to designs by Edward Prioleau Warren for Charles St John Hornby, replacing an earlier house of 1878 by Joseph Peacock on the same site.

The building is constructed of red brick laid in Flemish bond with Portland stone dressings. The roofs, which originally used Westmoreland slate, are now covered in Welsh slate. The interior has concrete floors.

The house is square in plan, comprising four storeys plus a basement and attic. The entrance opens onto Embankment Gardens, with the building adjoining number 2 to the west. The principal rooms are arranged internally around a stairwell on the north side.

The exterior is designed in a late 17th-century domestic style, with the two main elevations facing Chelsea Embankment to the south and Embankment Gardens to the east. The north elevation opens onto the rear garden. A prominent modillion eaves cornice sits above the hipped roof, which features alternating segmental and triangular pedimented dormer windows on the south elevation and flat-roofed dormers to the north and east. Rusticated stone quoins mark the angles, and a stone band runs below the third floor. The fenestration is largely regular, with multi-paned timber sash windows set in segmental arched openings with rubbed brick voussoirs and raised keystones. Cast-iron rainwater goods include decorative initialled hoppers bearing the date '1913'.

The five-bay south elevation contains a canted, stone-faced oriel window on the first floor of the central bay, supported on a pair of carved console brackets. Above this sits a flat-roofed open loggia with Ionic and engaged columns. Its parapet carries a cartouche with carved foliage and decorative reliefs.

The five-bay east (entrance) elevation, with two additional stepped-back bays at the north end, features a two-storey canted, stone-clad oriel window to the first and second floors supported on carved console brackets. Beneath this is a rubbed brick round-arched niche with pilasters and an oversize keystone. The main entrance, in the fourth bay, is a square-plan stone porch with a pair of Scamozzi Ionic columns, segmental pediment, and a balustrade with vase-shaped balusters on the north and east sides. The stone door surround is flanked by Ionic pilasters, and the original double-leaf hardwood door retains original ironmongery including a bronze door knocker and letter flap. An elaborate fan-light with radial glazing bars sits above the door. Above the porch, a window with an elaborate shouldered stone surround rises to the third floor, crowned with a carved head at the lintel centre and a triangular pediment.

The eight-bay north (garden) elevation includes the two recessed bays at the east end. The slightly projecting central three bays have a stone Venetian window on the first floor with a large stepped keystone rising to a narrow cornice in the central arch. On the ground floor is a tripartite window in stone panels with square-headed outer windows and a segmental central arch, all with raised keystones. The second floor features regular fenestration broken by a central arched brickwork panel. The first floor of the western three bays contains a loggia with a tripartite opening featuring Scamozzi Ionic and engaged columns, entablature, and a balustrade with vase-shaped balusters. The windows within the loggia adopt the same narrow-wide-narrow configuration as those above and below. A datestone to the lower quoin of the north-east angle reads: 'THIS STONE WAS LAY ON SEPTEMBER 25TH 1912 BY MICHAEL & DIANA HORNBY. EDWARD WARREN ARCHT. HOLLOWAY BROS. BUILDERS.'

The interior is accessed through an elongated vestibule with a barrel-vaulted ceiling. The vestibule connects to the stair hall via a passage with an arcade on the north side featuring a pair of Scamozzi Ionic columns. The passage has a moulded plaster cornice with modillions and a moulded ceiling panel with stylised foliage to the border. The main stair hall features a large fireplace on the west wall with a moulded grey-veined white marble surround, plaster cornice mantelpiece, tiled hearth, and marble apron. The varnished hardwood, closed-string, open-well staircase has vase-shaped balusters, a moulded handrail, and square-section panelled newel posts with ball finials.

The ground-floor principal room was originally a library but was converted to an Oratory in the late 1970s, with the insertion of a lower coffered ceiling, square panelling, and an altar featuring an imported 18th-century Spanish painted wooden reredos with barley-twist columns and carved statues. The former schoolroom retains an original timber chimneypiece with a cast-iron hearth and hand-painted tile border, plus a panelled over-mantel with integrated Arts and Crafts style shelving.

The first-floor landing is treated similarly to the stair hall and has a plaster ceiling with deep coffering. The principal room, occupying the entire building width, is the former drawing room, divided into two sections by a partial screen with engaged scagliola Scamozzi Ionic columns. The ceilings feature quality plasterwork with roundels bordered by amassed fruits. Each section has a fireplace with grey-veined pink marble bolection surrounds, marble aprons, and decorative coloured hearth tiles (those in the northern section are partially damaged). The room opens onto the loggia via the central section of a glazed tripartite opening. The loggia has an inlaid stone floor with stucco bolection-moulded panelling on return walls and a bullseye window in the east return.

The second and third floors retain less ornate decoration but significant survival of panelling, fireplaces (some removed), and decorative plasterwork including cornices and decorated doorcase arches, despite later partitioning. A bedroom and sitting room on the second floor were converted to an oratory in the late 1970s with a moulded plaster ceiling possibly of modern date. The attic and basement contain no original features of note beyond the original parquet floor in the basement servants' hall. Panelling and original timber flooring survive extensively throughout the building.

The basement light well, with white glazed tiling on the north side, is enclosed by iron railings with spear-head finials separated by square-section brick piers with moulded stone caps and elaborate decorative finials.