The Adelphi

The Adelphi

This purpose-built office building was constructed between 1936 and 1938 to designs by Stanley Hamp of the architectural practice Colcutt and Hamp. Two additional storeys were added in 1993, in a style and materials that broadly match the original building. Late 20th-century alterations have been made to the interior.

Structure and Materials

The building has a steel frame with reinforced concrete and pot floors. The riverside frontage is clad in Portland stone, while the elevations facing inland combine buff brick with Portland stone. Originally the building had eight storeys facing John Adam Street, with a further three storeys on the Embankment side, where the ground level drops towards the river. The 1993 additions brought the total height to thirteen storeys.

Architectural Character

The design and detailing are strongly Moderne or Art Deco, a popular style for commercial buildings of this period. This is expressed through curved balconies on the river frontage, bronze anodised bow windows set within each recess, abundant sculpture, and jazzy patternwork around the entrance portals, cornices, and in the bronze railings and panels. Classical motifs also appear, including coffering under the colonnade and carved putti in the side elevation door surrounds.

Sculpture

Much of the carved stonework is figurative. Four giant allegorical relief figures occupy the corners of the Embankment front, representing from west to east: 'Dawn' by Bainbridge Copnall, 'Contemplation' by Arthur J Ayres, 'Inspiration' by Gilbert Ledward, and 'Night' by Donald Gilbert. These figures are impressive in scale and visual power. They frame the advancing wings and their expressive gestures emphasise the building's verticality. Carved under the direction of Gilbert Ledward, one of the foremost British sculptors of the interwar period, the four sculptures are among the few remaining architectural works by him in situ. The sculptors each carved their figure in situ during autumn 1937.

Also important are the carved reveal panels flanking the entrance doors on John Adam Street, created by Newbury Abbot Trent and depicting scenes of industry. Other sculpture includes carved coats of arms of UK cities at ground floor level on the east and west elevations, and smaller panels on various themes including the signs of the zodiac, agriculture, and industry. The artists of these features are unknown, but their abundance, period character, and considerable charm contribute to the building's interest. The lettering above the entrances, in sans serif capital letters, was executed by George Manswell.

Levels and Access

The building incorporates a roadway and promenade on the south side, known as Adelphi Terrace, with views across Victoria Embankment Gardens and the river. A garage undercroft takes advantage of the slope down to the Thames, allowing vehicular access at street level from Savoy Place. The treatment of the drop in levels to the Embankment gives the building a particularly dramatic effect. The two side wings project on square pillars over the upper road, which itself rests on a colonnade at Embankment level running alongside Savoy Place. This multi-level arrangement was designed with the motor car in mind and is a characterful expression of interwar modernity. The stonework here is sharply cut and unmoulded, contrasting with the more undulating upper floors with their curved balconies and bow windows. On Savoy Place, fluted classical columns and Art Deco bronzework illustrate the eclecticism characteristic of the 1930s.

Interior

Some elements of the original Art Deco interior survive, such as the pillars around the perimeter and Travertine marble surfaces in the main entrance lobby to John Adam Street. The Art Deco-style etched-glass panels are late 20th century. The main east and west staircases survive with their Travertine marble cladding. A flat brass handrail is supported on decorative, black-painted posts. The secondary stairs are plainer, of concrete and with tubular steel handrails from the 1980s. The stairs from the foyer to garage level have been infilled. On the upper floors the offices are mainly open plan and have been comprehensively stripped out and reworked since 1938. The main east-west corridor on each floor has been lost and the original north-south corridor on the John Adam Street level has been compromised. The lift and service cores have been repositioned.

Historical Context

Construction of the office block required an Act of Parliament, the Adelphi Act of 1933, due to covenants on the site imposed by a statute of 1771 relating to the original development of the area by brothers John, Robert, James, and William Adam from 1772. Adelphoi is Greek for brothers. The Act gave permission for the demolition of 24 Georgian houses built by the Adams, and also placed conditions on the height of the new building and required the developers to maintain and widen public thoroughfares. The demolition, which occurred in 1936, was one of the 20th century's most notorious losses of an historic building. It invigorated a nascent preservation movement and the loss of the Adelphi is regarded as one of the watersheds of early conservation history. Houses in the two side streets, Adam Street and Robert Street, and in John Street (now John Adam Street) are all that survive of the original development. The new office building was originally called the New Adelphi; it is now known simply as the Adelphi.

Colcutt and Hamp was a major early 20th-century architectural practice. Stanley Hamp was at first an assistant to the noted Victorian architect Thomas Edward Collcutt, designer of the Imperial Institute in South Kensington and Wigmore Hall in the West End, before becoming a partner in 1906. Hamp's arrival secured the partnership's commercial and architectural success in the transition from the pre- to post-First World War eras. As A Stuart Gray describes, he "introduced a quite extraordinary exuberance into the firm's work".

Gilbert Ledward is best known for his sculpture of soldiers on the Guards Division Memorial in St James's Park, London (1926, Grade II) and was a Royal Academician who worked in bronze and stone. Bainbridge Copnall's most famous work is the figures on the façade of the Royal Institute of British Architects. Arthur J Ayres and Donald Gilbert are lesser known but belong to an important transitional phase in British sculpture between the late 19th-century New Sculptors and the 20th-century modernists. Newbury Abbot Trent, who carved the reveal panels to the main entrance, is another sculptor at the Adelphi whose work is representative of the high standard of interwar sculpture.

Setting

The Adelphi forms part of a group of riverside buildings of considerable monumentality, from Shell-Mex House to Brettenham House of 1931-32 alongside Waterloo Bridge, with which the Adelphi has group value.