Russell Hotel and Attached Railings With Piers and Lamps

RUSSELL HOTEL AND ATTACHED RAILINGS WITH PIERS AND LAMPS, RUSSELL SQUARE

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Overview

Heritage Category:
Listed Building
Grade:
II*
List Entry Number:
1246152
Date first listed:
03-Dec-1970
List Entry Name:
Russell Hotel and Attached Railings With Piers and Lamps
Statutory Address:
RUSSELL HOTEL AND ATTACHED RAILINGS WITH PIERS AND LAMPS, RUSSELL SQUARE
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Date:
2004-10-13
Reference:
IOE01/13024/11
Rights:
© Mr Brian Jackson. Source: Historic England Archive

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Official list entry

Heritage Category:
Listed Building
Grade:
II*
List Entry Number:
1246152
Date first listed:
03-Dec-1970
List Entry Name:
Russell Hotel and Attached Railings With Piers and Lamps
Statutory Address 1:
RUSSELL HOTEL AND ATTACHED RAILINGS WITH PIERS AND LAMPS, RUSSELL SQUARE

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.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

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.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

Location

Statutory Address:
RUSSELL HOTEL AND ATTACHED RAILINGS WITH PIERS AND LAMPS, RUSSELL SQUARE

The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.

County:
Greater London Authority
District:
Camden (London Borough)
Parish:
Non Civil Parish
National Grid Reference:
TQ 30178 82085

Details

CAMDEN

TQ3082SW RUSSELL SQUARE
798-1/95/1423 (East side)
03/12/70 Russell Hotel and attached railings
with piers and lamps

GV II*

Hotel. 1892-98. By Charles Fitzroy Doll, surveyor of the
Bedford Estate. Red brick with terracotta dressings. Roofs and
turrets with green fishscale tiles. Tall slab chimney-stacks
with horizontal brick and terracotta bands. Originally with
central copper dome and lantern, now with tile mansard roof.
STYLE: flamboyant French Renaissance style derived from
engravings of the Chateau de Madrid, with elaborate
decorations.
EXTERIOR: 8 storeys, attics and basements. Symmetrical facade
of 7 gabled bays with octagonal corner turrets. Return to
Bernard Street, 12 windows; return to Guilford Street, 8
windows and attached rectangular tower at the right-hand
angle. Facade articulated vertically by octagonal turrets with
ogee roofs at angles, penultimate gabled bays with canted bay
windows rising from ground to 6th floor terminating in half
ogee roofs with 2-light windows, and a 3-bay central,
projecting porch with round-arched entrance flanked by single
window bays rising to 4th floor level with recessed bay
windows forming the central bay above the entrance. Projecting
modillion cornice at 5th floor level above which flanking bays
become 3 storey semicircular turrets surmounted by conical
tile roofs with gablets and linked across the now flat,
recessed central bay by a wide arch surmounted by a scrolled
pediment with 2 round-arched, paired windows, an entablature
with the date 1894, above which a rectangular gabled dormer.
All with elaborate terracotta decoration. Round-arched ground
floor windows in shallow, arcading with attached Ionic
columns. Other windows square-headed, mostly mullion and
transom casements. 1st floor with continuous projecting
arcaded terracotta balconies with round-arched balustrade and
coats of arms in the spandrels. At 1st floor level flanking
the balcony over the entrance, figures wearing historical
costume in corbelled niches. 2nd floor continuous balconies
with terracotta round-arched balustrades. 3rd and 4th floor
windows with cast-iron continuous balconies. Projecting
modillion cornice at 5th floor level above an enriched frieze,
following the contours of the bays. Shaped gables with
horizontal brick and terracotta bands and small windows.
Returns in similar style.


INTERIOR: entrance hall lined in pink and red marble divided
into 3 by grey marble round-arched arcades on grey marble
columns with gilding. Frieze and spandrels with sumptuous
plaster moulded females of proto art-nouveau character. Marble
staircase rises to right. Ceiling in Jacobean style.
Chandeliers, and some stained glass. Woburn Suite beyond a
large hall now with low partitions, with black and white
marbled pilasters, heavy modillion cornice and coved ceiling
with lavish swags under false ceiling. 'Victorian Carvery'
with grey marble panelling to frieze height and grey marble
clad hexagonal columns which culminate in alternating little
Ionic columns and sculpted figures. Similar columns in frieze
around walls. Projecting fireplace in matching marble.
Chandeliers. King's Bar panelled to frieze height with some
organic capitals to pilasters, doorcases (one now a bookcase)
with giant Jacobean keystones under plaster friezes of chubby
putti. Marble fireplace. Trabeated ceiling with a variety of
mouldings. Virginia Woolf room with art nouveau plaster
spandrels and plaster ceiling cornices. Bedford Suite with
pilasters and plaster ceilings.
SUBSIDIARY FEATURES: attached wrought-iron railings with
terracotta piers and cast-iron lampstandards with figures at
the bases on piers.
HISTORICAL NOTE: Doll's flamboyant use of terracotta is a
distinctive feature of the Bedford Estate; this is his finest
remaining building and the survivor of two extravagant 1890's
hotels that imposed a fin-de-siecle character on Russell
Square.

Listing NGR: TQ3017882085

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:
477923
Legacy System:
LBS

Legal

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

Ordnance survey map of Russell Hotel and Attached Railings With Piers and Lamps

Map

This map is for quick reference purposes only and may not be to scale. This copy shows the entry on 07-Jun-2026 at 15:26:57.

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© Crown copyright [and database rights] 2026. OS AC0000815036. Use of this mapping is subject to Terms and Conditions.

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.

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