Royal Star and Garter Home

Home and hospital for disabled servicemen, built 1919-24 by Sir Edwin Cooper, based on a plan of 1915 by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott. The building stands on Richmond Hill on a steeply sloping site.

The structure is constructed of red brick with stone dressings on a steel frame, with hipped pantile roofs, heavy modillion eaves cornice and symmetrically-spaced stacks. The plan is figure-of-eight in form. The front elevation rises four storeys and attic, whilst the rear elevation rises six storeys with attic, including one storey beneath a projecting walled garden. Single storey wings flank this garden.

The front elevation comprises seven bays with a central door and five-bay return. Seven-bay side-wings are set back and end in single-bay pavilions, all situated behind projecting single-storey nine-bay screens. The centre and pavilions feature paired Corinthian columns in antis forming aedicules to recessed fenestration—a typical Cooper motif. The garden front has twenty-one bays between single-bay pavilions in the same style, with central paired columns rising above a wreathed portrait medallion surmounted by a crown. Doors lead onto a terrace above a projecting ground-floor loggia of Roman Doric columns, now glazed, which continues along right-angled wings for ten bays, the last containing a recessed moulded entrance and paired columns in antis. A heavy cornice runs along the loggia, which has a central door leading to a paved garden with a central bulb-shaped fountain surmounted by cherubs.

The seven-bay side elevations each have a central bay with an aedicule surround and balcony. All windows are small-pane glazing bar sashes; those to the first floor on the entrance front (third floor on the garden front) are set in stone surrounds. Pedimented dormers appear on all elevations, with an additional storey hidden in the roof to the main elevations.

The interior features an entrance hall with Ionic columns, coffered ceilings, and marble walls and floors. To the left is an apsed memorial alcove with stained glass by J Dudley Forsyth; to the right a staircase is set in a similar apse. Offices occupy the front, with a ward for the especially handicapped to the rear, leading onto the terrace. Six lifts and stairs provide access to the lower ground floor, which contains a dining room to the right and recreation hall to the left, featuring square columns forming an aisle and coffered ceiling.

Hospital facilities are located to the front. A mortuary chapel in the basement beneath the walled garden is reached via a separate pylon doorway to the side, bearing a winged figure wreathed in poppies on the lintel. The chapel has a tripartite interior separated by Doric columns set between pilasters, with marble walls and floors, coffered ceilings, stained glass, and star-shaped light fittings. It is dedicated to the son of Viscountess Cowdray, whose bust it contains. Upper floors contain bed-sitting rooms and staff accommodation.

The building represents a revolutionary concept in provision for disabled people, allowing ex-servicemen to lead independent lives in a building carefully planned for their convenience that is also of high architectural quality with lavish original fittings.