Naval And Military Club

Naval and Military Club

A town mansion dating from 1756–1760, designed by Matthew Brettingham (1699–1769) for Lord Egremont. The building stands as a detached Palladian-styled hôtel particulier set back from Piccadilly behind a forecourt, bounded on the right by the return wall of no. 93 Piccadilly and on the left by a single-storey range of three windows with a tripartite window and rusticated basement to Piccadilly; this left-hand wing appears to date from the mid to late 19th century.

The present structure reflects at least two and possibly three 19th-century building phases. Around 1822, the house became the residence of the Marquess of Cholmondley, steward of the royal household and friend of George IV. After 1829 it assumed semi-royal status as the London residence of the Duke of Cambridge, seventh son of George III. The final major phase came after 1876 when the Naval and Military Club took the lease; the architect for this phase was J McVicar Anderson.

The exterior is faced in Portland ashlar, with courtyard elevations in brick with stone dressings. The front wall and gate piers are of Portland stone and yellow brick, furnished with wrought-iron gates, cast-iron lanterns and torcheres. The hipped roof of slate covers the forecourt.

The main block comprises three storeys with a seven-window range, three windows at the centre projecting in a shallow pedimented bay. The centre first-floor window displays a Serlian motif and opens onto the Cambridge Room, with French doors to a first-floor balcony. Windows on this floor have moulded architraves and pediments. Square windows with moulded architraves light the second floor or attic storey. A distyle in antis Tuscan porch with pediment frames the entrance at the centre. The first-floor balcony and entrance porch date from the mid to late 19th century. All windows and doors are flat-arched unless otherwise noted.

Interior

The interior is of exceptional interest, preserving works by Matthew Brettingham, unknown early 19th-century architects, and J McVicar Anderson.

The entrance foyer and front hall to the west are separated by a screen wall of circa 1876; a marble fireplace on the west wall of the front hall appears to date from the late 18th century. The foyer, front hall, long corridor and passage into the single-storey wing are floored with black and white tesserae. The long corridor runs along the western edge of the rear courtyard, shared between no. 94 Piccadilly and no. 12 White Horse Street without visible break. This corridor comprises a series of rib-vaulted bays with Tuscan piers and responds, dating to circa 1876.

The Smoking Room, also by McVicar Anderson and circa 1876, is entered from the corridor's midpoint and has an L-shaped plan; one arm opens onto the interior courtyard, the other returns on a north-south axis to the forecourt and opens onto the stair wall. The room is articulated by fluted Ionic pilasters and piers with richly moulded entablature, fireplaces and door surrounds—some of the latter may be late 18th century. A marble fireplace in the north-east corner features an authentic late 18th-century design with a frieze of ivy leaves, a mythological figure in low relief, and cameo portraits.

The long corridor continues to the rear, where within no. 12 White Horse Street stands a high single-storey block of brick containing the Coffee Room, designed by McVicar Anderson in late 18th-century style. It has a rectangular plan, lit by round-arched windows to the north, with Ionic pilasters and columns; rectangular alcoves to north, east and west; and a pair of late 19th-century Adam-style fireplaces flanking the north alcove. Above the entablature runs a series of round-arched tympana; the ceiling heightens at the centre with a coved cornice.

A cast-iron verandah of particular note runs along the west and north sides of the inner courtyard, comprising slender, elegantly proportioned cast-iron colonnettes with lean-to roof. It appears to date from the 1820s or early 1830s; the stone balustrade on which it is carried may be of the same date or somewhat later.

The great stair hall occupies the centre of the original block, with the stair rising in three flights; its treads are very likely original, while the cast-iron balustrade, wall decoration and domed skylight date to circa 1876.

On the first floor or piano nobile stands a suite of three rooms facing the forecourt. To the east is the Palmerston Room, three windows wide and roughly square in plan, with walls ornamented with stucco bas-reliefs, swags, cornices and dado panels, and an ornamental ceiling. The east and north walls contain a gilded door surround (now blocked) and mirror, details suggesting affinity with 1820s Empire-style work. The marble chimney piece in the east wall is late 18th century and of fine quality.

The Cambridge Room occupies the centre of the elevation; its decorative details (including four concave round-arched niches) appear to be 19th century, except for the pilasters, responds and architraves to the tripartite window, which appear original to Brettingham's design.

The room to the west, the Egremont Room, was rebuilt after extensive bomb damage in the Second World War to original designs.

To the rear of the Palmerston Room runs the long Regimental Room with late 18th-century decorative details and a splendid Brettingham chimneypiece featuring a pair of female, toga-clad figures carrying baskets of fruit.

West of this room, on axis with the entrance, is the Octagon Room, eight-sided as its name suggests, with an especially fine pair of pedimented doorcases and a splendid 1870s chimneypiece and overmantel in Rococo Revival style; a coved ceiling features coffering.

The front wall attached to the west wing contains two gates and two doors, surmounted with lanterns and torcheres. The gate piers are celebrated for bearing the painted legends 'IN' and 'OUT', which gave the club its popular name of the 'In and Out Club'.

Lord Palmerston occupied no. 94 Piccadilly from 1857 until his death in 1865; a London County Council plaque of 1961 in the forecourt wall commemorates his occupancy.