4, St James'S Square Sw1

TQ 2980 SE CITY OF WESTMINSTER ST. JAMES'S SQUARE, 82/22 SWl 5.2.70 No. 4 G.V. II* Terraced town mansion. Rebuild or remodelling of a Barbon 1675-77 town house in 1726-28 following fire damage, attributions to Giacomo Leoni but also to Hawksmoor (ref. to 12 drawings for this house in his 'post mortem' inventory), as well as to Edward Shepherd. Amber stock brick, slate roof. Astylar Palladian facade with lofty piano nobile. 2 storeys and attic storey, with basement. 5 windows wide. Entrance in 2nd bay from left with stone Ionic columned porch, pilasters to wall flanking recessed 8-panel door with rectangular fanlight. Recessed glazing bar sash windows with stone architraves, those on ground floor eared with pulvinated friezes and cornices identical in level and form to that of porch; those on 1st floor (lowered) with pediments on consoles and the attic storey with the architraves eared top and bottom. Plat band and sill bands underlining ground and 1st floors. Moulded stone entablature over piano nobile and secondary cornice and blocking course to attic. Low pitched hipped slate roof virtually concealed. Early C.19 stone balcony to 1st floor with simple cast iron railing. Late C.18/early C.19 cast iron spear head area railings with urn finials. The rear garden front has a 4 window wide main block with 4-window return, no dressings but with 1st floor plat band and sill band and early C.19 balcony and crowning entablature with low parapet. The east wing has a C.19 stock brick 4-window extension following the main lines of the original. Fine interior, of unusual plan owing to northward extension of the site; notable features include hall with Baroque chimneypiece and arcade leading to inner hall and stair compartment (with later column screen), a very fine Palladian design with early C.20 embellishments to the original plasterwork, 2 archivolt arched windows flanking niche containing a plaster version of Rysbrack's Chiswick Inigo Jones statue, appropriately Jones-Palladian pattern to original ceiling, spacious stone stairs with fluted column balusters; 1st floor ballroom behind the entire front with Palladian stuccowork to coved ceiling and mid C.19 neo-Rococo gilded embellishments; rear drawing room, with original cornice dado and shutters, redecorated in mid C.19 French Rococo taste; this French Rococo decoration may well be designed by Earl de Grey whose residence this was from 1834 to 1859 and who was his own architect and interior designer at Wrest Park; redecoration on ground floor to rear c.1920 by D.P. Milne and P. Phipps etc. For building across end of garden see under Nos. 7 to 9 consec. Babmaes Street, SW1. Survey of London; Vol. XXIX.

Listing NGR: TQ2954480445