4, Grosvenor Square W1

TQ 2880 NW and 2880 NE CITY OF WESTMINSTER GROSVENOR SQUARE, 68/23 ;69/150 Wl 14.1.70 No. 4 - II Terraced town house. 1865-68 by the builder C.J. Freake with facade by Thomas Cundy III, interior largely remodelled 1931-34 by Lord Gerald Wellesley of Wellesley and Wills for the Italian Embassy. White Suffolk brick and Portland stone, slate roof. Italianate Cundy style. 4 storeys, basement and dormered mansard. 5 windows wide. Banded stone ground floor with central porch of coupled Tuscan columns. Plate glass recessed sashes. Upper floors, with rusticated quoining, have 1st floor windows with alternating pediments on engaged Corinthian columns, the central one elaborated with tripled columns and cresting over segmental pediment, all with balustraded balconies, the central 3 linked and carried over porch; 2nd floor windows with eared architraves and cornices and simplified version to 3rd floor. Sill course to 3rd floor with carved enrichment below sills. Rich entablature with modillion cornice and balustraded parapet broken by central panel surmounted by cartouche. Stone balustraded area parapet. Interior retains drawing room ceiling and possibly marble grand staircase, top lit, of the 1860s but the Rococo balustrade of the 1960s, and some marble chimney pieces - otherwise restrained Italianate neo-classical by Gerald Wellesley. One of only 4 houses in the square to survive mid C.20 rebuilding. Survey of London; Vol. XL.

Listing NGR: TQ2849180833