Cope House

TQ 2580 SE KENSINGTON PALACE GARDENS W8 26/19 14.5.84 15B (Cope House) GV II

House, formerly stables to No 15. 1854-6, architect James Thomas Knowles Snr (1806-84), for George Moore, lace manufacturer and philanthropist; contractors Lucas Brothers and Stevens of Lambeth. Converted to house 1937-8, architects J. Fooks and T. Ritchie. Brick faced in stucco, Welsh slated hipped roofs to wings, those of centre concealed by balustraded parapet, stuccoed chimney stacks with modillion cornices. Central block originally stables, with tack rooms and lofts in north wing, and coach house in south wing. Two storeys, Italianate style, matching the main house on a smaller scale. Ground floor rusticated and vermiculated, with pulvinated frieze, and modillion cornice at first floor level, first floor with rusticated quoins. Slit windows on ground floor, arched openings on first floor, some blank, with modelled keystones, and aedicules with segmental pediments carried on moulded consoles. Frieze and bold overhanging cornice with bracket modillions. Modern windows in centre. Ground floor continues from north wing as screen wall, surmounted by balustrade, concealing former stable yard from garden of No.15, breaks forward with arched opening with horse's head modelled on keystone. Continuation of screen wall opened out to form colonnade in 1980s. Low screen wall surmounted by balustrade runs west along carriage drive, and now forms property boundary. Interior much-altered and not inspected. House and stables were virtually unchanged when, in December 1923, the lease was assigned to Daniel William Fooks. His widow surrendered the lease in January 1938, on condition that the property was divided, and she was given the lease of the stables for residential conversion. The main house was leased by Sir Alfred Beit, son of the financier and philanthropist Sir Otto Beit, and internally remodelled by Lord Gerald Wellesley and Trenwith Wills in 1937-8. The property was divided along the line of the old screen wall south of the house. Further alterations took place in the 1980s. [Survey of London, Vol XXXVII, pp 175-8]