Vittoria House

Vittoria House

House, spa and assembly rooms, now offices. Built circa 1801–4 for Henry Thompson as his own dwelling and originally known as Hygeia House. The building underwent later additions and alterations, including a late 19th-century range to the right.

The main structure is built of ashlar over brick with a concealed roof, brick ridge stack, and a wrought-iron balustrade to the rear. The original plan was single depth with central full-height bows to front and rear, surrounded by a colonnaded loggia on the ground floor. The interior contains a stairhall to the front and a main L-shaped room to the rear and left.

The exterior is two storeys with three bays, the windows arranged 1:3:1. A two-storey single bay is set back to the right, with a further two-storey lower bay set back again. Six-over-six sash windows throughout are set in plain reveals with sills. The loggia features Doric columns, now infilled to the front with a central entrance of double six-panel doors—the upper panels fielded, the lower panels bearing a circle motif—topped by an overlight with decorative glazing bars in an oval pattern. The left return has tripartite windows to the ground and first floors, with six-over-six sashes flanked by two-over-two sashes. First-floor windows are separated by Doric columns. A Diocletian window with sashes occupies the second floor, set within a round-arched recess extending the full height. The Doric loggia continues to the rear of the main part.

The interior retains many original features including joinery and plasterwork. An inner door has a similar oval-motif overlight. Doors, reveals, and shutters feature lozenge panels with fluted architraves, and fleurons and lion masks ornament the corners of windows and doors. Embellished cornices grace the ground floor, with simpler versions above. An open-well staircase, probably altered in the mid-19th century, retains alternate stick and ornate iron balusters, with a handrail supported by newel posts with lion-paw feet.

A boot scraper is present at the front step. To the rear, between the columns runs a balustrade with embellished rods and circle motif. The enriched lead castings are in 18th-century style, forming a simpler version of a balcony that appears in "Original Designs in Architecture" by William Thomas, published in 1783. This ironwork represents the earliest datable examples in the town.

Henry Thompson purchased land to the south and east of the Old Well from the de la Beres in 1801 and built Hygeia House for his own occupation. He began dispensing mineral waters here in 1804, and the original Montpellier Spa commenced in this house. The spa and assembly rooms relocated in 1809 to the site of the present Montpellier Rotunda in Montpellier Walk, and moved again by 1813 to the site of the Queen's Hotel on the Promenade. The house was presumably renamed Vittoria House around this date, after 21 June 1813. Thompson died here in 1820 and was succeeded in ownership by Robert Morris. An engraving of circa 1813 depicted a symmetrical facade with a colonnade on all four sides. The building represents a notable survival from the first phase of the new spa town's development.