A history of the Old War Office Building

Other Buildings - Northumberland House & Metropole Building

Metropole Building, formerly the 'Hotel Metropole'

Architectural detail in the ceilings moulds of Metropole Building, a reminder of its luxurious past

Northumberland House, formerly the 'Hotel Victoria'

Decorative 'marble' detail in the foyer of Northumberland House

By the nineteenth century the majority of the great late-medieval ‘river palaces’ that ran along the Strand west towards Charing Cross had been replaced by more modern and less prestigious dwellings.  The sole survivor in private hands was Northumberland House which had been built during the reign of James I in 1605.

However with the creation of the Thames Embankment, the London Metropolitan Board of Works proposed in 1865 to create a new major road from Charing Cross and Trafalgar Square down to the river.  Attempts to purchase the site were initially opposed by the Duke of Northumberland, but the building was damaged by fire in 1868 and in late 1873 his heir agreed to sell the Northumberland House site and several other nearby properties for some £500,000.

By early 1876 Northumberland House had been demolished and a new 30 metre-wide thoroughfare created along which, by the 1880’s, new buildings were being erected.  Among these were several hotels, the Grand Hotel, the Hotel Metropole and the Hotel Victoria built by the Northumberland Avenue Hotel Company.  This spate of hotel building was something of a fashion at the time despite the fact that many projects proved to be costly over-runs; the hotel Victoria, for example, cost £520,000, more than double the original estimate, probably reflecting the need for very deep foundations because of an underground stream on the site.

According to historians of the hotel trade, American visitors in particular tended to use the Northumberland Avenue hotels which were palatial and luxurious, and had the advantage of a central position with easy access to both the City and the West End and to Parliament and the ‘Clubs’ as well as to the major railway termini.

 Northumberland House..

Last Updated: 3 Mar 04