Victoria House from Bloomsbury Square 02

Victoria House is a neoclassical building in Bloomsbury, London, WC1. It stands on a long rectangular island site between the east side of

Bloomsbury Square Bloomsbury Square is a garden square in Bloomsbury, in the London Borough of Camden, London. Developed in the late 17th century, it was initially known as Southampton Square and was one of the earliest London squares. By the early 19th century, B ...

and

Southampton Row The A4200 is a major thoroughfare in central London. It runs between the A4 at Aldwych, to the A400 Hampstead Road/ Camden High Street, at Mornington Crescent tube station. Kingsway Kingsway is a major road in central London, desig ...

. It became a Grade II

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

in December 1990.

History and description

The building was designed by Charles William Long and constructed in the 1920s, in a style described by

Pevsner Pevsner or Pevzner is a Jewish surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Aihud Pevsner (1925–2018), American physicist * Antoine Pevsner (1886–1962), Russian sculptor, brother of Naum Gabo * David Pevsner, American actor, singer, da ...

as "

Neo-Grec Néo-Grec was a Neoclassical Revival style of the mid-to-late 19th century that was popularized in architecture, the decorative arts, and in painting during France's Second Empire, or the reign of Napoleon III (1852–1870). The Néo-Grec v ...

". It was built for and occupied for many decades as the head office of the Liverpool and Victoria Friendly Society. The east side of Bloomsbury Square was formerly a terrace of houses, which included the London house of the 18th century judge

Lord Mansfield William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield, PC, SL (2 March 170520 March 1793) was a British barrister, politician and judge noted for his reform of English law. Born to Scottish nobility, he was educated in Perth, Scotland, before moving to Lond ...

, which was looted in the Gordon Riots. The building was constructed between 1926 and 1932. The building was constructed with a steel frame and Portland stone façades. It has eight main storeys, plus basement and sub-basement, with 15 bays along the east and west elevations, and five bays on the north and south sides. The rusticated ground floor level has retail units on Southampton Row.

Giant order In classical architecture, a giant order, also known as colossal order, is an order whose columns or pilasters span two (or more) storeys. At the same time, smaller orders may feature in arcades or window and door framings within the storeys tha ...

pilaster, separated by window openings, span the second to fourth floors, with porticos in the centre of each long side. The tympanum of each triangular pediment includes figurative sculptures by Herbert William Palliser, with the group to the west representing the bounty of the natural world and the group to the east representing navigation and industry. Two further storeys in the frieze and parapet levels, and two in the green slate mansard roof with

dormer window A dormer is a roofed structure, often containing a window, that projects vertically beyond the plane of a pitched roof. A dormer window (also called ''dormer'') is a form of roof window. Dormers are commonly used to increase the usable spac ...

s, topped by a small central two-storey feature above the mansard. Inside, each side retains its original entrance lobby faced with Subiaco marble, and ornamental brasswork by the

Bromsgrove Guild The Bromsgrove Guild of Applied Arts (1898–1966) was a company of modern artists and designers associated with the Arts and Crafts Movement, founded by Walter Gilbert. The guild worked in metal, wood, plaster, bronze, tapestry, glass and ...

, some with the "VH" monogram. A large central space on the ground floor opens to three floors, with a coffered ceiling. Although the exterior of the building is largely unchanged, the interior has been extensively modernised, with work completed in 2003. Interior features of historic interest were retained and refurbished to their former condition, including the original

Art Deco Art Deco, short for the French ''Arts Décoratifs'', and sometimes just called Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design, that first appeared in France in the 1910s (just before World War I), and flourished in the Unite ...

ballroom which was transformed into the Bloomsbury Ballroom function venue, while other areas were substantially remodelled to create large amounts of office and leisure space. A retail area with open arcade was added to the Southampton Row frontage, recreating its former appearance prior to redevelopment in the 1950s. The Bloomsbury Ballroom featured in the final episode of

The Apprentice (UK series ten) The tenth series of British reality television series ''The Apprentice (UK)'' was broadcast in the UK on BBC One, from 14 October to 21 December 2014; due to live coverage in Summer of that year for both the FIFA World Cup and the Commonwealth ...

where it was used as the location for the two finalists' business launches. File:Portico of building on the east side of Bloomsbury Square, WC1 - geograph.org.uk - 1304671.jpg, Portico on west side of building, facing Bloomsbury Square File:Relief on Victoria House, Bloomsbury.jpg, Detail of

pediment Pediments are gables, usually of a triangular shape. Pediments are placed above the horizontal structure of the lintel, or entablature, if supported by columns. Pediments can contain an overdoor and are usually topped by hood moulds. A pedimen ...

at top of west portico, showing

relief Relief is a sculptural method in which the sculpted pieces are bonded to a solid background of the same material. The term ''relief'' is from the Latin verb ''relevo'', to raise. To create a sculpture in relief is to give the impression that the ...

sculpture File:Victoria House, Bloomsbury (7), inside main entrance.jpg, Inside main entrance File:Victoria House, Bloomsbury (6), inside main entrance.jpg, Detail of brasswork

References

External links

Bloomsbury Ballroom website
{{coord, 51.5193, -0.1221, type:landmark_region:GB, display=title Grade II listed buildings in the London Borough of Camden Buildings and structures in Bloomsbury 1932 architecture