17, Upper Grosvenor Street W1

No. 17 Upper Grosvenor Street is a terraced town house built between 1906 and 1907 by Balfour and Turner. It is constructed of Portland stone with a slate roof. The design is a distinctive example of Balfour and Turner’s style, characterised by a generously windowed facade drawing freely on the late 17th-century Belgian-Dutch classicism found in places like the Brussels Grande Place. The house is four storeys high, with a basement, and has a width of four windows. The right-hand entrance is deeply recessed between projecting piers topped with naturalistically carved caps. The ground floor features a canted stone bay window with small-pane glazing bar sash windows within enriched architraves. The first floor has full-height, nearly flush glazing bar sashes, separated by pilasters on pedestals, supporting an entablature with a fine naturalistically carved frieze. The second floor includes segmental arched casements, also separated by smaller pilasters with caps at the impost level. The top floor’s glazing bar sashes rise from a cornice-sill course in shallow panels divided by pilasters. A moulded main cornice and a pediment is positioned over the central two bays, set against a balustraded parapet. A first-floor balcony features a graceful ironwork trellis balustrade. The cast and wrought iron area railings are of an individual design. The interior was designed by White Allom and Co. incorporating a central reception hall and main staircase lit from above with a Tijou-style balustrade. The Morning Room underwent a 1927 Art Deco refurbishment, featuring veneered wood work by G. Trollope & Sons.