Gwydyr Mansions is a block of mansion flats in the centre of

Hove Hove is a seaside resort and one of the two main parts of the city of Brighton and Hove, along with Brighton in East Sussex, England. Originally a "small but ancient fishing village" surrounded by open farmland, it grew rapidly in the 19th c ...

, part of the English coastal city of

Brighton and Hove Brighton and Hove () is a city and unitary authority in East Sussex, England. It consists primarily of the settlements of Brighton and Hove, alongside neighbouring villages. Often referred to synonymously as Brighton, the City of Brighton and H ...

. Built on the initiative of a

Baptist Baptists form a major branch of Protestantism distinguished by baptizing professing Christian believers only ( believer's baptism), and doing so by complete immersion. Baptist churches also generally subscribe to the doctrines of soul compe ...

pastor and designed by the prolific architecture firm of Clayton & Black, the "elegant"

Flemish Renaissance The Renaissance in the Low Countries was a cultural period in the Northern Renaissance that took place in around the 16th century in the Low Countries (corresponding to modern-day Belgium, the Netherlands and French Flanders). Culture in the Low C ...

-style building dates from 1890 and overlooks a central square. As originally built, the block had a restaurant and barber shop for residents; the latter is still operational.

History

The Wick estate was a large area of land north of the ancient village of Hove. Sir Isaac Lyon Goldsmid, part of the Goldsmid banking dynasty, bought most of the land for development in 1830. The estate was in size and consisted of farmland, pastures and woodland. Until then, Thomas Scutt and

Thomas Read Kemp Thomas Read Kemp (23 December 1782 – 20 December 1844) was an English property developer and politician. Life He was the son of Sussex landowner and Member of Parliament Thomas Kemp, and his wife Anne, daughter of Henry Read of Brookland ...

owned the land: they developed the high-class Brunswick estate on part of it, and sold the rest to Goldsmid. Residential and commercial development was gradual but steady for the rest of the 19th century. One of the main developments was Palmeira Square, built in the 1850s and 1860s as an open square of housing with gardens in the middle and a public garden to the north. Holland Road, laid out in 1833 but still mostly undeveloped by the mid-1850s, led north from Palmeira Square. Goldsmid was created Baron Goldsmid of Palmeira in 1845, and the square took its name from this title; Holland Road was named after

Henry Vassall-Fox, 3rd Baron Holland Henry Richard Vassall-Fox, 3rd Baron Holland of Holland, and 3rd Baron Holland of Foxley PC (21 November 1773 – 22 October 1840), was an English politician and a major figure in Whig politics in the early 19th century. A grandson of Henry F ...

(Lord Holland), a Whig statesman and friend of Goldsmid. Holland Road Baptist Church was built in 1883 on land (known as the Goldsmid Estate) that was owned by Goldsmid's descendants; the terms of the Goldsmid Estate Act 1879 made it easier for parts of the site to be sold for development. The church's first pastor, Rev. David Davies, proposed a scheme for a block of luxury flats opposite the church on a site between Holland Road, Palmeira Square and Rochester Gardens. The site was bought in 1890, and Brighton-based architects Clayton & Black were commissioned to design the building. Established in the 1870s, this firm designed many types of building in Brighton and Hove over a 100-year period and in an eclectic range of styles. The building was ready later in 1890. It was named after another associate of the Goldsmid family,

Peter Drummond-Burrell, 22nd Baron Willoughby de Eresby Peter Robert Drummond-Burrell, 2nd Baron Gwydyr, 22nd Baron Willoughby de Eresby PC (19 March 1782 – 22 February 1865), was a British politician and nobleman. Early life Born Peter Robert Burrell, he was the eldest of three sons born to Peter ...

. Like Sir Isaac Goldsmid, he supported

Jewish emancipation Jewish emancipation was the process in various nations in Europe of eliminating Jewish disabilities, e.g. Jewish quotas, to which European Jews were then subject, and the recognition of Jews as entitled to equality and citizenship rights. It in ...

, and at the time of his visit to Hove to see the new Brunswick estate in the late 1820s he held the title 2nd

Baron Gwydyr Baron Gwydyr, of Gwydyr in the County of Carnarvon, was a title in the Peerage of Great Britain. It was created on 16 June 1796 for Sir Peter Burrell, 2nd Baronet, who had earlier represented Boston and Haslemere in the House of Commons. The B ...

. Each of the 50 flats had servants' accommodation, reflecting the social status of the expected occupants: from the beginning Gwydyr Mansions was aimed at wealthy people. Flats were for rent, not sale, as was common at the time. Clayton & Black's design included several facilities for residents: the whole ground floor was taken up by a bank with its own entrance, there was a 60-seat restaurant in the basement, and also at basement level there was a barber shop—the Gwydyr Gentlemen's Hairdressing Saloon. It was refitted in 1936 and is still in use, unlike the restaurant and bank. In 1940, the restaurant was identified as a potential "emergency rest centre" for war casualties. Gwydyr Mansions are within the Brunswick Town Conservation Area, one of 34 conservation areas in the city of Brighton and Hove. The area was designated by Hove Council in 1969.

Architecture

The mansions, one of Clayton & Black's first commissions for a new building, are Flemish

Renaissance Revival Renaissance Revival architecture (sometimes referred to as "Neo-Renaissance") is a group of 19th century architectural revival styles which were neither Greek Revival nor Gothic Revival but which instead drew inspiration from a wide range o ...

in style. The walls are of red brick with large areas of pale ashlar, especially around the windows. The main entrance is on the Rochester Gardens elevation and is next to the former entrance to the bank, which is flanked by Tuscan columns '' in antis''. Above is a

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 pedim ...

with a

cartouche In Egyptian hieroglyphs, a cartouche is an oval with a line at one end tangent to it, indicating that the text enclosed is a royal name. The first examples of the cartouche are associated with pharaohs at the end of the Third Dynasty, but the f ...

. There are canted

bay window A bay window is a window space projecting outward from the main walls of a building and forming a bay in a room. Types Bay window is a generic term for all protruding window constructions, regardless of whether they are curved or angular, or ...

s rising through all four storeys and oriel windows at the corners, and the "busy" façade also features domed turrets,

crow-stepped gable A stepped gable, crow-stepped gable, or corbie step is a stairstep type of design at the top of the triangular gable-end of a building. The top of the parapet wall projects above the roofline and the top of the brick or stone wall is stacked in ...

s and other elaborate gables. The barber shop was refitted in 1936 with vitrolite fixtures, but a glazed screen designed by Clayton & Black survives near the entrance.

References

Notes

Bibliography

* * {{B&H Buildings Residential buildings completed in 1890 Renaissance Revival architecture in the United Kingdom Apartment buildings in England Houses in Brighton and Hove Clayton & Black buildings