Portland Place
Portland Place is a street in the Marylebone district of central London. Named for the Third Duke of Portland, the unusually wide street is home to the BBC Broadcasting House and Polish embassies, the Royal Institute of British Architects; the street was laid out by the brothers Robert and James Adam for the Duke of Portland in the 1770s and ran north from the gardens of a detached mansion called Foley House. It was said that the exceptional width of the street was conditioned by the Duke's obligation to his tenant, Lord Foley, that his views to the north would not be obscured. In the early 19th century, Portland Place was incorporated into the royal route from Carlton House to Regent's Park via Langham Place, developed for the Prince Regent by John Nash; the street is unusually wide for central London. The ambitious plans included a third circus to complement Piccadilly Circus and Oxford Circus known as Regent's Circus. Portland Place still contains many of the spacious Georgian terraced houses built by the Adams, as well as some early 20th century buildings and a few post World War II bombing In administrative terms, Portland Place lies within the City of Westminster's Marylebone High Street Ward as well as the Harley Street Conservation Area.
Many of the houses are now occupied by company headquarters, professional bodies and charities. The landmark headquarters of the Royal Institute of British Architects sits at 66 Portland Place directly opposite the Chinese embassy. Other foreign diplomatic institutions include the Polish Embassy, a Portuguese consulate, the High Commission of Kenya, the Swedish Ambassador's Residence and the Colombian Consulate. In addition, Portland Place remains a fashionable address with some exclusive blocks of mansion flats. Number 1 houses the Institution of Chemical Engineers, number 41 the Academy of Medical Sciences, number 23 houses the Nursing and Midwifery Council, number 67 the Royal Air Force Benevolent Fund and number 76 the Institute of Physics; the Institute of Physics building replaced two earlier Georgian terrace houses, one of which – number 76 – was the home of John Buchan, the author and politician who lived there from 1912 until 1919, which resulted in Portland Place being the London home of Richard Hannay, the hero of Buchan's most famous novel "The Thirty-Nine Steps".
Its northern end opens into Nash's elegant stucco semicircular Park Crescent, which in turn leads on to Park Square and Regent's Park. There are two landmark buildings at the south end of the street, although both are technically in Langham Place: the grand late Victorian Langham Hotel, Broadcasting House. Langham Place is a short road which connects Portland Place to Upper Regent Street, although on the ground they all appear to be one street. A Grade II listed memorial to Quintin and Alice Hogg erected in 1906 stands opposite Broadcasting House at the south end of Portland Place. There are a number of international independent schools on Portland Place, including Abercorn Upper School, Queens College and the Southbank International School. Portland Place was the home of Jane Gamble, the character on whom Henry James based his novel The Portrait of a Lady. Jane Gamble was the real-life subject of My Courtship and its Consequences by Henry Wikoff. Portland Place was the London address of Adam Verver and his wife, the former Charlotte Stant, in the last complete major novel by Henry James, The Golden Bowl.
Portland Place is the home of Richard Hannay in John Buchan's novel. Portland Place is the home of Stephen Jones in H. P. Lovecraft's short story "The Horror in the Museum". Portland Place is featured in Daphne du Maurier's novel Julius. Portland Place is the location of the private hotel where Valeria and Eustace stay after their truncated honeymoon in The Law and the Lady by Wilkie Collins. Portland Place is a metaphor for Septimus Warren Smith's view of the world as a strange but wonderful place in Virginia Woolf's novel Mrs Dalloway. List of eponymous roads in London August 1967 British Pathe Newsreel covering the "Battle on Portland Place" Georgian London by Sir John Summerson ISBN 0-7126-2095-8 Media related to Portland Place at Wikimedia Commons
Regent Street
Regent Street is a major shopping street in the West End of London. It is named after George, the Prince Regent and was laid out under the direction of the architect John Nash and James Burton, it runs from Waterloo Place in St James's at the southern end, through Piccadilly Circus and Oxford Circus, to All Souls Church. From there Langham Place and Portland Place continue the route to Regent's Park; the street's layout was completed in 1825 and was an early example of town planning in England, replacing earlier roads including Swallow Street. Nash and Burton's street layout has survived, although all the original buildings except All Souls Church have been replaced following reconstruction in the late 19th century; the street is known for its flagship retail stores, including Liberty, Hamleys and the Apple Store. The Royal Polytechnic Institution, now the University of Westminster, has been based on Regent Street since 1838. Regent Street is 0.8 miles long and begins at a junction with Charles II Street as a continuation of Waterloo Place.
It runs north to Piccadilly Circus, where it turns left before curving round the Quadrant to head north again, meeting Oxford Street at Oxford Circus. It ends at a junction with Cavendish Place and Mortimer Street near the BBC Broadcasting House, with the road ahead being Langham Place, followed by Portland Place; the southern section of the road is one-way northbound and part of the A4, a major road through West London. From Piccadilly Circus northwards, it is numbered A4201, though in common with roads inside the London congestion charging zone, the number does not appear on signs. Nearby tube stations are Piccadilly Circus and Oxford Circus. Several bus routes, such as 6, 12, 13, run along Regent Street. Regent Street was one of the first planned developments of London. An ordered structure of London streets, replacing the mediaeval layout, had been planned since just after the Great Fire of London when Sir Christopher Wren and John Evelyn drew plans for rebuilding the city on the classical formal model.
After a lack of progress, houses were rebuilt on the old street network anyway. In 1766, John Gwynn complained in London and Westminster Improved that there was a lack of planning throughout the West End and that it would be useful to construct a thoroughfare linking Marylebone Park with the Prince Regent's Carlton House. John Fordyce was appointed as Surveyor-General to the First Commissioner of Woods and Forests in 1793 and concluded that there should be a suitable road in place by 1811, when the lease for Marylebone Park ran out and ownership reverted to the Crown, it was hoped the road could link Pall Mall and the Haymarket, of which has since declined in quality. A further problem was increased congestion around Charing Cross, which would benefit from road improvements; the street was designed by James Burton. Nash proposed forward his own plans for the street in 1810 following the death of Fordyce, envisioning broad, architecturally distinguished thoroughfares and public spaces. Nash planned to construct a straight boulevard as seen in French cities, but this was not possible because of land ownership issues.
The final design resulted in a road situated further west than on previous plans, Nash believed the road would run down a de facto line separating the upper classes and nobility in Mayfair with the working class in Soho. The northern section involved demolishing most of the existing Swallow Street, which had become run down and was an ideal candidate for regeneration; the road was designed to curve east between Oxford Street and Piccadilly so that it did not meet St James's Square, the circuses allowed visual continuity down the street. The central section, known as the Quadrant, was designed for "shops appropriated to articles of fashion and taste," and was Nash's centrepiece for the street, it was built with a colonnade of cast-iron columns, allowing commuters to walk along the street without having to face bad weather. The buildings along the Quadrant had different facades, a deliberate choice by Nash to break away from the uniform design of the previous century and a pragmatic means of using what building materials were available and what clients wanted.
The road was planned to end outside Carlton House in Pall Mall, the residence of the Prince of Wales. Nash insisted; the design was adopted by an Act of Parliament in 1813, which permitted the commissioners to borrow £600,000 for building and construction. The street was intended for commercial purposes and it was expected that most of the income would come from private capital. Nash took responsibility for valuation of all properties. Construction of the road required demolishing numerous properties, disrupting trade and polluting the air with dust. Existing tenants had first offer to purchase leases on the new properties; the Treasury supported the proposal because, in the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars, there was an urgent need for the government to create jobs. Government expenditure was low because the design relied on private developers, such as Nash himself; the buildings were let on 99-year leases, as was common at the time, income could be recouped in the form of ground rent. Although Nash was responsible for the street's general development, some buildings were designed by Charles Robert Cockerell and Sir John Soane, amongst oth
London County Council
London County Council was the principal local government body for the County of London throughout its existence from 1889 to 1965, the first London-wide general municipal authority to be directly elected. It was replaced by the Greater London Council; the LCC was the largest, most ambitious English municipal authority of its day. By the 19th century the City of London Corporation covered only a small fraction of metropolitan London. From 1855 the Metropolitan Board of Works had certain powers across the metropolis, but it was appointed rather than elected. Many powers remained in the hands of traditional bodies such as parishes and the counties of Middlesex and Kent; the creation of the LCC in 1889, as part of the Local Government Act 1888, was forced by a succession of scandals involving the MBW, was prompted by a general desire to create a competent government for the city, capable of strategising and delivering services effectively. While the Conservative government of the day would have preferred not to create a single body covering the whole of London, their electoral pact with Liberal Unionists led them to this policy.
It was established as a provisional council on 31 January 1889 and came into its powers on 21 March 1889. Shortly after its creation a Royal Commission on the Amalgamation of the City and County of London considered the means for amalgamation with the City of London. Although this was not achieved, it led to the creation of 28 metropolitan boroughs as lower tier authorities to replace the various local vestries and boards in 1900; the LCC inherited the powers of its predecessor the MBW, but had wider authority over matters such as education, city planning and council housing. It took over the functions of the London School Board in 1903, Dr C W Kimmins was appointed chief inspector of the education department in 1904. From 1899 the Council progressively acquired and operated the tramways in the county, which it electrified from 1903. By 1933, when the LCC Tramways were taken over by the London Passenger Transport Board, it was the largest tram operator in the United Kingdom, with more than 167 miles of route and over 1,700 tramcars.
One of the LCC's most important roles during the late 19th and early 20th century, was in the management of the expanding city and the re-development of its growing slums. In the Victorian era, new housing had been intentionally urban and large-scale tenement buildings dominated. Beginning in the 1930s, the LCC incentivised an increase in more suburban housing styles. A less-dense style of development, focusing on single family homes, was popular among London housing developers because it was believed that this would satisfy the working classes and provide insurance, "against Bolshevism," to quote one parliamentary secretary; the LCC set the standard for new construction at 12 houses per acre of land at a time when some London areas had as many as 80 housing units per acre. The passage of the Housing of the Working Classes Act in 1885 gave the LCC the power to compel the sale of land for housing development, a power, vital to the systematic rehousing that began under the council's early Progressive leadership.
The Totterdown Fields development at Tooting was the first large suburban-style development to be built under LCC authority, in 1903, was followed by developments at Roehampton and Becontree. By 1938, 76,877 units of housing had been built under the auspices of the LCC in the city and its periphery, an astonishing number given the previous pace of development. Many of these new housing developments were genuinely working-class, though the poorest could afford subsidised rents, they relied on an expanding London Underground network that ferried workers en masse to places of employment in central London. These housing developments were broadly successful, they resisted the slummification that blighted so many Victorian tenement developments; the success of these commuter developments constructed by the LCC in the periphery of the city is, "one of the more remarkable achievements in London government, contributed much to the marked improvement of conditions between the wars for the capital's working classes."
The LCC undertook between 1929 to standardise and clarify street names across London. Many streets in different areas of the city had similar or identical names, the rise of the car as a primary mode of transportation in the city made these names unworkable. In an extreme case, there were over 60 streets called "Cross Street" spread across London when the LCC began its process of systematic renaming; these were given names from an approved list, maintained by the LCC, containing only "suitably English" names. If street names were deemed un-English, they were slated for change. By 1939, the council had the following powers and duties: † Denotes a power administered by the City of London Corporation within the City; the LCC used the Spring Gardens headquarters inherited from the Metropolitan Board of Works. The building had been designed by Frederick Marrable, the MBW's superintending architect, dated from 1860. Opinions on the merits of the building varied: the Survey of London described it as "well balanced" while the architectural correspondent of The Times was less enthusiastic.
He summarised the building as "of the Palladian type of four storeys with two orders, Ionic above and Corinthian below as if its designer had looked rather hastily at the banqueting house of Inigo Jones." The most impressive feature was the curving or elliptical spiral staircase leading to the principal floor. The origin
University of Westminster
The University of Westminster is a public university in London, United Kingdom. Its antecedent institution, the Royal Polytechnic Institution, was founded in 1838 and was the first polytechnic institution in the UK. Westminster was awarded university status in 1992 meaning, its headquarters and original campus are in Regent Street in the City of Westminster area of central London, with additional campuses in Fitzrovia and Harrow. It operates the Westminster International University in Tashkent in Uzbekistan. Westminster's academic activities are organised into seven faculties and schools, within which there are around 45 departments; the University has numerous centres of research excellence across all the faculties, including the Communication and Media Research Institute, whose research is ranked in the Global Top 40 by the QS World University Rankings. Westminster had an income of £170.4 million in 2012/13, of which £4.5 million was from research grants and contracts. Westminster is a member of the Association of Commonwealth Universities, the Association of MBAs, EFMD, the European University Association and Universities UK.
The Royal Polytechnic Institution was built by William Mountford Nurse in 1837 and opened at 309 Regent Street on 6 August 1838 to provide “an institution where the Public, at little expense, may acquire practical knowledge of the various arts and branches of science connected with manufacturers, mining operations and rural economy.” Sir George Cayley, the "father of aeronautical engineering", was the first chairman and the Polytechnic formally received a Royal charter in August 1839. The Polytechnic housed a large exhibition hall, lecture theatre and laboratories, public attractions included working machines and models, scientific lectures and demonstrations, rides in a diving bell and, from 1839, demonstrations of photography. Prince Albert visited the institution in 1840, when he descended in the diving bell, became a patron in 1841; the first public photographic portrait studio in Europe opened on the roof of the Polytechnic in March 1841. In 1848, a theatre was added to the building, purpose-built to accommodate the growing audiences for the Polytechnic’s optical shows.
These combined magic lantern images with live performances, music and spectres, illuminated fountains and fireworks in sophisticated displays, spreading the fame of what was arguably the world’s first permanent projection theatre.‘Professor’ John Henry Pepper joined the Polytechnic in the 1840s. Best known today for his illusion ‘Pepper’s Ghost’, his contribution to education deserves recognition. Pepper established evening classes in engineering, applied science and technical subjects for young working Londoners, beginning the tradition of widening access to education continued by the University of Westminster today. Expansion gave way to financial difficulty, reflecting a long-standing tension between education and the need to run a successful business. A fatal accident on the premises in 1859 caused the first institution to be wound up and a new one formed. Various regeneration schemes were considered, but in 1879 a fire damaged the roof, precipitating the final crisis. In September 1881, the Royal Polytechnic Institution closed, marking a transition to new ownership and a new era of educational development.
Christian philanthropist Quintin Hogg acquired the lease to the building in December 1881 for £15,000. Hogg had established a Ragged School and Boys Home in the Covent Garden area of London to provide a basic education for some of London’s poorest children. In 1873, he established the Youths' Christian Institute and Reading Rooms to provide educational, religious and social opportunities for young working men. Membership fees paid for free use of a library, social rooms and entertainments for members; the Institute was renamed the Young Men's Christian Institute. Following Hogg’s purchase of 309 Regent Street, the YMCI moved into the new premises, re-opening on 25 September 1882. About 6,000 members and students – three times the anticipated number – attended during the first 1882/3 session; the institute adopted the name the Polytechnic Young Men’s Christian Institute, or the Polytechnic, for short. From 1882 an expanded programme of classes began, including science and art classes held in conjunction with the Science and Art Department, a scheme of technical and trade education, related to the City and Guilds of London Institute of Technical Instruction and to the London Trades Council.
The building housed classrooms, a swimming bath, a refreshment room. Activities included daily chapels, Parliamentary debating, a Reading Circle and drama societies and several sports clubs. By 1888 membership was 4,200, in addition to 7,300 students, over 200 classes were held weekly as well as concerts, an annual industrial exhibition. Membership was open to those aged between 16 and 25. A Young Women's Branch, housed in separate premises in Langham Place, was established. In the early 1880s the Institute attracted much favourable attention from the technical education lobby. Following the City of London Parochial Charities Act in 1883, it became clear that funds would be available to endow the Polytechnic and to found and support institutions on the same model across London. A public appeal was launched in 1888 to raise the required matching funding; the Scheme was finalised under the auspices of the Charity Commissioners in 1891, when the Institute was recons
Sir James Hogg, 1st Baronet
Sir James Weir Hogg, 1st Baronet was an Irish-born businessman and politician, who served in England as a Liberal Conservative Member of Parliament Hogg was born in Lisburn, County Antrim, the eldest son of William Hogg and his wife Mary, née Dickey. He was educated at Dr Bruce's Academy, at Trinity College, where he was elected a Scholar, he was called to the Bar and proceeded to India in 1814, where he obtained a large and lucrative practice. In 1822 he accepted the appointment of Registrar of the Supreme Court of Judicature, which he held until his return to England in 1833. In 1839 he was elected a Director of the East India Company, he was elected MP for Beverley in 1834, represented Honiton from 1847–1857, which seat he lost by two votes at the general election that year. Hogg was twice Chairman of the East India Company, in 1858 when the government of India was transferred to The Crown he was elected member of the Council of India, until his resignation in 1872, aged eighty two, he was created a Baronet, of Upper Grosvenor Street in the County of London, in 1846, was offered the posts of Judge Advocate General and the Governorship of Bombay, both of which he refused.
Hogg married on 26 July 1822, the daughter of Samuel Swinton of Swinton House, Berwickshire. He brought a libel action against Barnard Gregory for publishing an accusation in The Satirist that his wife was married to another man. Sir James and Lady Hogg had fourteen children. On his death in 1876, he was succeeded in the baronetcy by his son Sir James Macnaghten Hogg, who, on 5 July 1887, was created Baron Magheramorne, of Magheramorne in the County of Antrim, in the Peerage of the United Kingdom, as part of the celebrations for the Golden Jubilee of Queen Victoria. Hogg's seventh son Quintin Hogg was a merchant and philanthropist and the father of Douglas Hogg, 1st Viscount Hailsham and Sir Malcolm Hogg, who served on the Council of India, grandfather of Quintin Hogg, Baron Hailsham of St Marylebone, he died in 1876, aged 85–86. Hogg Baronets John Nicholson Obituary, The Times, 29 May 1876. "The Late Sir James Hogg". Leigh Rayment's list of baronets Leigh Rayment's Historical List of MPs Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Sir James Hogg
Hanover Square, Westminster
Hanover Square is a square in Mayfair, situated to the south west of Oxford Circus, the major junction where Oxford Street meets Regent Street. The streets which converge at Hanover Square are: Brook Street, Dering Street, Hanover Street, Harewood Place and Princes Street. Hanover Square was developed from 1713 as a fashionable residential address by Richard Lumley, 1st Earl of Scarbrough, a soldier and statesman best known for his role in the Glorious Revolution. Like Scarbrough, most of the early residents were staunch supporters of the Hanoverian succession of 1714. "Early Hanover Square was decidedly Whig and most decidedly military", commented the architectural historian Sir John Summerson. Early residents included Generals Earl Cadogan, Sir Charles Wills, Evans, Lord Carpenter and John Pepper, "names conspicuously associated with episodes in Marlborough’s war and the'Fifteen'."While a few of the 18th-century houses remain intact, most of the square has been reconstructed in a variety of periods.
It is now entirely occupied by offices, including the London office of Vogue, the UK headquarters of the telecoms and data consultancy Expect Solutions, MVA Consultancy, the global headquarters of property consultancy SMART4. The parish church of St George's, Hanover Square, is a short distance to the south of the square at the junction of St George Street and Maddox Street, built on land given by William Steuart. In 1759 James Abercrombie, commander-in-chief of British forces in North America during the French and Indian War, resided in St George Street. BibliographySir John Summerson, Georgian London, London: Penguin, 1969 Edward Walford, Hanover Square and neighbourhood and New London: Volume 4, pp. 314–326
Douglas Hogg, 1st Viscount Hailsham
Douglas McGarel Hogg, 1st Viscount Hailsham, PC was a British lawyer and Conservative politician who twice served as Lord Chancellor, in addition to a number of other Cabinet positions. Mooted as a possible successor to Stanley Baldwin as prime minister for a time in the 1930s, he was considered to be one of the leading Conservative politicians of his generation, it was said by Lord Denning that he "looked like Mr. Pickwick and spoke like Demosthenes". Born in London, Hogg was the son of the merchant and philanthropist Quintin Hogg, the seventh son of Sir James Hogg, 1st Baronet, of Alice Anna Hogg, née Graham, he was educated at Cheam School and Eton College, before spending eight years working for the family firm of sugar merchants, spending time in the West Indies and British Guiana. During the Boer War he served with the 19th Yeomanry, was wounded in action. Returning from South Africa, he was called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn in 1902; as a junior, he built up a large practice in commercial law.
He was appointed King's Counsel in 1917, became a bencher of Lincoln's Inn and Attorney-General to the Prince of Wales in 1920. He devoted considerable time to the Royal Polytechnic institution, which his father had founded. A Conservative, Hogg began to be involved in politics at the bar, he was approached to be the Party's candidate for Marylebone, but stood down before the 1918 election in deference to the sitting member. He became involved in the Conservatives' legal attacks against the Liberals during the Marconi scandal. Hogg was appointed Attorney General by Bonar Law in October 1922. Though not an MP, Hogg was chosen for the position because Bonar Law found himself short of law officers after the Conservative-Liberal coalition collapsed as a result of the Carlton Club meeting, he was returned to the House of Commons unopposed for St Marylebone in the 1922 general election. Though he had been involved with Conservative politics before, his sudden rise caused some comment. Harold Macmillan records the following exchange between the Earl of Derby and Duke of Devonshire:'Ah,' said Lord Derby,'you are too pessimistic.
They have found a wonderful little man. One of those attorney fellows, you know, he will do all the work."What's his name?', said the Duke.'Pig,' said Lord Derby. Turning to me, the Duke replied,'Do you know Pig? I know James Pigg. I don't know any other Pig.' It turned out to be Sir Douglas Hogg! This was a Trollopian scene. Hogg received the customary knighthood was sworn in the Privy Council in December 1922. Serving as Attorney General until Labour assumed office after the 1923 election, Hogg was reappointed to the post, with a seat in the Cabinet, when the Conservatives were returned to power in 1924; as Attorney-General, Hogg guided the Trade Disputes Act of 1927 through the House of Commons after the general strike of 1926 which had ended with large-scale unemployment while those still employed were forced to accept longer hours, lower wages, district wage agreements. The Trade Disputes and Trade Union Act made mass picketing and all sympathetic strikes illegal and directed that union members had to contract into any political levy.
It forbade civil service unions from affiliating with the Trades Union Congress. On 29 March 1928, Hogg became Lord Chancellor in Stanley Baldwin's government, succeeding to the Viscount Cave, on 5 April was created Baron Hailsham, of Hailsham in the County of Sussex, his elevation to the peerage barred him from the premiership, would interfere with the political ambitions of his elder son, Quintin Hogg, said to have stood in Christ Church's Peckwater Quad to cry in frustration. He held the Great Seal until the government's defeat in 1929. In that year's Birthday Honours he was created Viscount Hailsham, of Hailsham in the County of Sussex. Between 1930 and 1931 Hailsham was the Leader of the Opposition in the House of Lords. During that period, he was spoken of as Baldwin's potential successor, he was passed over for the Lord Chancellorship in the National Government of August–October 1931, refused to join it as Lord Privy Seal. After the October 1931 elections he joined the second National Government as Secretary of State for War and Leader of the House of Lords.
In 1935, Hailsham returned to the Lord Chancellorship, first under Baldwin under Neville Chamberlain. During his second term, he was the last Lord High Steward to preside over the trial of a peer in the House of Lords. In 1938, ill-health led to his appointment as Lord President of the Council, a post with less onerous duties, but he had to retire from the government a few months four days before his son was first elected to the House of Commons, he died on 16 August 1950. The first Viscount Hailsham served as President of the MCC in 1933, he was an important contributor to the diplomacy involved following the Bodyline Series problems of 1932-33 during the English Cricket tour of Australia under the captaincy of Douglas Jardine Lord Hailsham married Elizabeth Marjoribanks, widow of the Hon Archibald Marjoribanks, daughter of James Trimble Brown of Tennessee, in 1905. They had two sons: Quintin McGarel Hogg, 2nd Viscount Hailsham Baron Hailsham of St Marylebone, barrister and Lord Chancellor who disclaimed the viscountcy and was given a life peerage.
Hon William Neil McGarel Hogg, diplomat. Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by the Viscount Hailsham
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