Claremont Lodge

Claremont Lodge, Montpellier Spa Road, Cheltenham

Villa, now subdivided into 3 flats and 2 houses, dating from around 1800-10 with later alterations. An upper storey and entrance porch were added in 1835, and a range to the right was constructed around 1860. The building is constructed of brick with stucco render, concealed roof, and stucco chimney stacks. It features a wrought-iron verandah and follows a double-depth plan with a central hallway and a service range to the right.

The exterior presents three storeys across the main frontage, with four first-floor windows arranged in a 1:2:1 pattern. The central feature is a full-height bowed bay window. To the left is a two-lower-storey, one-window range, and to the right is a two-lower-storey, six-window range. The original windows are predominantly 6/6 sashes in plain reveals. The central bay contains 6-pane French windows with a lattice frieze and divided overlights at ground and first-floor levels. The range to the right includes some 1/1 sashes with margin-lights. The building is topped by a crowning cornice, low parapet, and copings. The ranges to left and right each have a central ground-floor Ionic column; the range to the far right incorporates two additional Ionic columns now embedded into the wall. The right-hand range has two entrances—one off-centre to the left and one to the far right—with 6-panel doors with fanlights and a part-glazed door.

The left return elevation serves as the entrance facade, presenting two storeys with three first-floor windows flanked by low ramped walls on either side. The first floor projects forward on four Ionic columns. The central entrance comprises a 6-panel door with a frieze and wide overlight featuring decorative glazing bars, set within an architrave with sunk panels to the pilasters. The ground floor displays four roundels, with blind openings at first-floor level. This elevation is topped by a crowning cornice and low parapet with copings, with a central upshot bearing a shell panel. Ramped walls flank both sides, punctuated by round-arched niches designed for urns.

Interior features include an inner hallway accessed through part-glazed double doors set within a fluted architrave, with an overlight and provision for a lantern. The ground-floor front south-east room contains a fresco above the fireplace depicting Claremont Lodge before the upper storey was added. Original plasterwork survives, including acanthus and ball motifs to the hall, and an acanthus frieze in the central bow-windowed room.

The main range features a continuous first-floor verandah with a rod-and-circle motif to the balustrade and rods to uprights, with a Gothic arcade to the frieze. Similar window guards appear to the first-floor windows.

This building represents part of the first phase of development in this area, probably constructed on land originally purchased by Henry Thompson for the de la Bere family. It follows a design comparable to Vittoria House in Vittoria Walk. Wrought-iron railings and lamp holders were removed during the Second World War.

The entrance facade was praised by DI Stratton-Davis in his Distinction Thesis held in the RIBA Library: "Although inconspicuous in size, it ranks with the most important of Cheltenham's buildings. In a composition itself quite unique every element has been carefully judged and every non-essential eliminated. The treatment of the Ionic order, and the lightness of touch everywhere displayed inevitably associates it with the designer of Montpellier Walk."

Claremont Lodge stands as a significant example of an early villa in Regency Cheltenham and forms part of an important group of surviving villas in this locality. Numbers 23 and 25 Vittoria Walk are also listed.