Admiralty House

Admiralty House is a Grade I listed building located in Whitehall, City of Westminster. Constructed between 1786 and 1788 by architect S. P. Cockerell, it serves as the residence for the First Lord of the Admiralty. The building is made of stock brick with Portland stone dressings and features a slate roof. Its neo-classical facade facing Whitehall is well-proportioned and restrained, while the rear side facing Horse Guards Parade is plain.

The house has three storeys, a basement, and a dormered hipped roof. The Whitehall front has three widely spaced windows with a recessed center. The ground floor is screened by a Portland stone forecourt and terrace wall, which includes two plain doorways at each end, topped with a band cornice and a blocking course finished with a cast iron balustrade. The first floor features recessed glazing bar sash windows set in semicircular arched panels, with the central window designed in a Venetian style. A pseudo-parapet is applied to the first floor, with blind balustrade panels below the windows, and there is a stone cornice and blocking course above.

The Horse Guards Parade front is five windows wide, with plain recessed glazing bar sash windows. It includes a first floor sill cornice, crowning cornice, and blocking course. The interior is notable for its fine features, including a segmental vaulted hall with Roman Doric pilasters and a screen of the same columns leading to the staircase. A cast iron "rostral column" stove is set in a niche, and the stone staircase has an elegant wrought iron balustrade, rising with single and divided arms and balconied main landings, illuminated by an oval glazed dome. The principal rooms on the ground floor contain reset chimney pieces in the Kent style dating from around 1721.