33 and 34 Surrey Street

33 and 34, Surrey Street WC2

Listed on the National Heritage List for England. Search over 400,000 listed places

Overview

Pair of town houses now part of King's College campus. 1767 with C20 internal alterations. Surviving vaults to the rear probably from the C17 mansion on the site. The late-C19 extension to the rear of No. 33 is not of special interest. Read the official list entry to find out more.

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: II
List Entry Number:: 1237425
Date first listed:: 05-Feb-1970
List Entry Name:: 33 and 34 Surrey Street
Statutory Address:: 33 and 34, Surrey Street WC2

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Date:: 2001-09-16
Reference:: IOE01/04280/03
Rights:: © Mr David Burns. Source: Historic England Archive

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Official list entry

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: II
List Entry Number:: 1237425
Date first listed:: 05-Feb-1970
Date of most recent amendment:: 04-Feb-2014
List Entry Name:: 33 and 34 Surrey Street
Statutory Address 1:: 33 and 34, Surrey Street WC2

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.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.

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.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

Location

Statutory Address:: 33 and 34, Surrey Street WC2

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:: TQ3086180893

Summary

Reasons for Designation

Nos. 33 and 34 Surrey Street are listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons: * Architectural interest: a pair of terraced townhouses dating from 1767, retaining their doorcases and external ironwork; although more altered internally a number of features of interest survive, most notably the stair to No. 33; * Historic interest: survival of vaults to the rear, providing evidence of the C17 mansion on the site; * Group Value: with the 'Roman Bath' (at No. 5 Strand Lane), with which No. 33 has historical links.

History

Records in the King’s College London archives (KA/T/21/5/1) date the building of 33 and 34 Surrey Street to 1767, following a fire of 1765 that destroyed the mansion previously occupying the site. According to the St Clement Danes rate books this mansion was built in circa 1692-4 and was owned successively by the Fox, Vernon and Danvers families. Brick vaults presumed to be from the mansion survive connected to the basements of the C18 houses.

In the late C18 and early C19, No. 33 ran the operation of the 'Roman Bath' located directly to the west at No. 5 Strand Lane, and to which it was connected at basement level. According to street directories, from the 1850s both houses ceased to be occupied as private houses and had become lodging houses. In the 1890s they were in single ownership and had become a private hotel. By 1915 No. 33 had become the offices for the Zenana Bible and Medical Mission and by 1921 No. 34 was also subdivided into a number of separate offices. In the late 1950s/early 1960s the houses were acquired by Kings College and linked to adjoining buildings as part of the campus.

Details

MATERIALS: stock brick laid in Flemish bond, No 34 painted; slate roofs.

PLAN: two-room deep with closet wings, altered on upper floors by insertion of transverse connecting corridors. The basements connect to transverse brick vaults, dated by analysis of the brick to c1664-1700. The vaults at one time connected to the Roman Bath (at No. 5 Strand Lane). Evidence of the blocked doorway survives. One of the vaults contains a copper in the north-east corner. A late-C19 extension to the rear of No. 33, extending over the southern part of the vaults, is not included in the listing.

EXTERIOR: three storeys high above a basement with dormered mansard roofs behind a parapet and a central chimney stack. The front elevations are three bays wide with stepped entrances on the left-hand side. The doorcases have pilasters and consoles carrying entablatures with dentil cornices and fluted friezes; No. 34 having a round arch. The doors are recessed in panelled reveals; No. 33 with a rectangular fanlight, No. 34 with a semi-circular fanlight. Both buildings have recessed sash windows under flat gauged-brick arches. The upper-floor sashes of No. 34 retain their glazing bars. The first floors have a brick platband and the parapet has stone copings. The houses are fronted by cast-iron area railings with flaming urn finials.

INTERIOR: the houses are now linked with each other and the buildings on either side to form a continuance of Kings College. No. 33 retains its open-well stair with open strings, ramped handrail and turned balusters. The stair continues into the basement, with stick balusters and turned newel post, although it has been capped at attic level. The stair of No. 34 has been replaced. The hall of No. 34 has a pilastered arch and a bracketed cornice; No. 33 has plainer mouldings and retains wooden panelling beneath the stair. Other cornices survive in some of the rooms of both houses.

MAPPING NOTE: the subterranean vaults which are part of this listed building are not mapped.

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:: 428682
Legacy System:: LBS

Sources

Books and journals
Pevsner, N, Bradley, S, The Buildings of England: London 6 Westminster, (2003), 371
Pre-Construct Archaeology, , 'Report No: R11125' in Strand Lane 'Roman Bath: The Results from the Sampling and Analysis of the Building Material from the Bath and Associated Structures, (November 2011)

Legal

This building is listed under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 as amended for its special architectural or historic interest.

The listed building(s) is/are shown coloured blue on the attached map. Pursuant to s.1 (5A) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 (‘the Act’), structures attached to or within the curtilage of the listed building (save those coloured blue on the map and the C17 underground vaults extending west from the basements of the two houses) are not to be treated as part of the listed building for the purposes of the Act.