46, Grosvenor Street W1

TQ 2880 NE CITY OF WESTMINSTER GROSVENOR STREET Wl 69/81 (south side) No 46 GV II* A large mansion. 1910 by Blow and Billerey, a refacing and restructuring of a pair of mid C18 houses. Portland stone, slate roof. A rather ponderous exercise in C18 French style. Four storeys and basement, the top floor as mansard attic. Three widely spaced window bays. The ground floor has deeply modelled rustication and 3 large semi-circular arched openings with carved head keystones. Piano nobile and second floor windows have architraves, those on first floor with balustrades incorporated in a dentilled and enriched plat band, and the architrave surmounted by pediments on consoles. Stone balustraded area wall. Rear to garden has a more animated design, 5 bays, the centre 3 advanced, with the first floor windows of the recessed bays and in the centre framed by pedimented aedicules. The interior retains highly ornate and stylistically electic decoration incorporating salvaged European medieval and Renaissance features combined and reset with great skill and craftsmanship (eg entrance hall and staircases) and on the first floor a grand late Louis XV style Music room/ ballroom with gilded boiseries and frescoed ceiling, probably by Maurice Tastemain for Billerey, etc. Survey of London Vol XL.

Listing NGR: TQ2853180761