Royal Opera Arcades (including No 24 Charles II Street and No 5B Pall Mall)
24, Charles II Street SW1
Listed on the National Heritage List for England. Search over 400,000 listed places
Overview
- Heritage Category:
- Listed Building
- Grade:
- I
- List Entry Number:
- 1235289
- Date first listed:
- 05-Feb-1970
- List Entry Name:
- Royal Opera Arcades (including No 24 Charles II Street and No 5B Pall Mall)
- Statutory Address:
- 24, Charles II Street SW1
Location
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Images of England Project
- Date:
- 2000-11-01
- Reference:
- IOE01/02577/30
- Rights:
- © Mrs Marion Davies. Source: Historic England Archive
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Discover moreOfficial list entry
- Heritage Category:
- Listed Building
- Grade:
- I
- List Entry Number:
- 1235289
- Date first listed:
- 05-Feb-1970
- List Entry Name:
- Royal Opera Arcades (including No 24 Charles II Street and No 5B Pall Mall)
- Statutory Address 1:
- 24, Charles II Street SW1
- Statutory Address 2:
- 5B, Pall Mall SW1
- Statutory Address 3:
- Royal Opera Arcade, Pall Mall SW1
- Statutory Address 4:
- Royal Opera Arcades, Royal Opera Arcade SW1
The scope of legal protection for listed buildings
This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.
Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.
For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.
The scope of legal protection for listed buildings
This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.
Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.
For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.
Location
- Statutory Address:
- 24, Charles II Street SW1
- Statutory Address:
- 5B, Pall Mall SW1
- Statutory Address:
- Royal Opera Arcade, Pall Mall SW1
- Statutory Address:
- Royal Opera Arcades, Royal Opera Arcade SW1
The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.
- County:
- Greater London Authority
- District:
- City of Westminster (London Borough)
- Parish:
- Non Civil Parish
- National Grid Reference:
- TQ 29723 80422
Details
TQ 2980 SE
82/16
CITY OF WESTMINSTER SW1.
ROYAL OPERA ARCADE
Royal Opera Arcades (including No 24 Charles II Street and No 5B Pall Mall)
5.2.70
GV
I
Shopping Arcade. 1816-1818 by John Nash and G.S Repton, the surviving portion of their recasing and completion of Novosielski's Haymarket Opera House. Stucco faced brick, slated and glazed lantern roof.
The arcade links Charles II Street to Pall Mall. It is the earliest London arcade on the Parisian late C18/earlyC19 model of "passages" and "galleries". The fronts to Charles II Street and Pall Mall have One and half storey archivolt arched entrances with imposts and scroll keystones and have moulded cornices below balustraded parapets; wrought iron gates. The arcade proper is formed of 18 square bays each ceiled with a plain groin vault pierced by a circular lantern light. The bays are separated by plain soffit arches rising from plain shafted Doric pilasters; the east wall is, since the 1896 rebuilding of Her Majesty's Theatre (Opera House), a blind arcade but the west side retains its original shop fronts, one to each bay. These have flat bowed windows and panelled and glazed doorways, generally to right hand, under entablature fascias. The mezzanine floor above each shop has an archivolt arched tripartite lunette window in the tympanum of the vault. Iron cased C19 lanterns suspended between every two shops.
The blind east arcade has been broken through at south end for mid C20 shops in keeping. Nash and Repton's arcade, although the first, was not a new idea as Thomas Leverton and John Fordyce had both promoted the provision of an arcade on the west side of Novosielski's theatre to improve and complete the ensemble since the latter's death in 1795.
Listing NGR: TQ2972380422
Legacy
The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.
- Legacy System number:
- 425936
- Legacy System:
- LBS
Sources
Books and journals
Survey of London in The Parish of St James Westminster Part 1 South of Piccadilly: Volumes 29 and 30, Vol. 29, (1960)
Legal
This building is listed under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 as amended for its special architectural or historic interest.
Map
This map is for quick reference purposes only and may not be to scale. This copy shows the entry on 24-Jun-2026 at 23:22:31.
Download a full scale map (PDF)End of official list entry
All text content is available under the Open Government Licence v3.0 , except where otherwise stated. Any supplied maps are © Crown Copyright [and database rights] 2026 OS AC0000815036 and may not be reproduced without permission.