Libertys

This is a department store block located on Regent Street, built between 1925 and 1926 by E.T. and E.S. Hall in a Beaux Arts classical style. The building has undergone internal alterations in the 1970s and 1980s. Constructed of Portland stone, the front of the building is distinguished by its curving facade and sculptural detailing. The upper floors at the rear are clad in white tiles.

The building is five storeys high, with a ground and first floor/mezzanine acting as a podium, and a concealed attic roof. Its symmetrical design features a nine-bay wide, inwardly curving section flanked by single-bay pavilions with concave corners. The ground floor and mezzanine are arranged around three main bays, incorporating a central entrance with Swedish granite, bronze shop windows, a wood-framed door, and display windows grouped in threes. Stone mullioned mezzanines have bronze guard rails and are supported by Roman Doric columns carrying a balustraded entablature with bronze-enriched obelisk dies. The pavilions have rusticated piers on the ground floor and mezzanine, with bowed corner entrances and a reappearing obelisk balustrade above them.

The upper floors of the curved section have recessed metal casement windows, articulated by a giant engaged Ionic colonnade carrying an enriched entablature. Above this rises a deep blind attic. A substantial sculptural relief, by Charles Doman and Thomas J Clapperton, depicts the wealth of distant countries being transported to Great Britain by camel, elephant, and ship, with a central figure of Britannia. The pavilions have grouped windows on the upper floors, flanked by panelled quoin piers; the main cornice projects forward above them and bends back over the concave corners. The attic story has a blocking course raised in a shallow, solid pediment on the front and side elevations. Four Japanese "Iohan” figures, originally from the shop, sit on a ledge above the entrance.

Internally, No. 208, originally a bank, retains marble columns and a ceiling decorated with triglyphs and paterae. Liberty's retains its original oak joinery to the lifts, door surrounds, panelling on the first floor, and a double oak staircase leading to the basement. The original main staircase was replaced with escalators in the 1970s and suspended ceilings were installed in the 1980s. The original shop was opened in 1875 by Arthur Lasenby Liberty at 218A Regent Street.