Willesden Green Underground Station

Details

935/0/10086 STATION ROAD 07-NOV-06 Willesden Green Willesden Green underground station

II

Underground station with integral shops. Station rebuilt at street level in 1925. Charles Walter Clark, architect for Metropolitan Railway Company.

MATERIALS: The facade to Walm Lane and the 3-bay returns to the south and to the north along Station Parade are faced with a distinctive cream terracotta tiling. This is dressed with moulded terracotta architraves, quoins, and raised panels. Windows are metal-framed casements, paired along the front with cross mullions.

EXTERIOR: To Walm Lane, a long facade of 5 parts with slightly canted end bays holding the canopies. There are 3 wide bays to the centre, these each with 2 windows above ground floor shops that have been largely replaced although 2 pairs of original doors survive as do the pilasters between. Continuous pronounced cornice with modillions above frieze that features original serif upper-case lettering announcing WILLESDEN GREEN STATION and M.R. to the centre, and METROPOLITAN RAILWAY over both canopies, in addition to the company's solid diamond motif. Cantilevered canopies over entrance are original but with late-C20 dark blue fascia and lettering in London Underground's identifiable sans serif typeface. Below and set within the station is a pair of original shops with quadrant shopfronts that have curved glass. To the centre is a cantilevered clock set within a metal-framed diamond-shaped frame.

South return elevation has single light windows with raised panels and WILLESDEN GREEN STATION lettering in frieze. North return has separate entrance labelled 'Chesham House' below oculus with swag, all this in similar terracotta tiles. Rear elevation is plain brick with no ornament and the windows (which overlook the platforms) were all replaced late-C20; this elevation is not of special interest.

INTERIOR: Booking hall is notable for its extensive lining of sea green tiles, with a frieze of yellow and mauve, and a dado band in similar colours also with the corporate diamond pattern. The sea green tiles are brick shaped and approximately 3 by 5 inches. Surviving fittings include wooden architraves with aprons to three ticket windows, high level small pane windows. The station was modernised in late-C20 with UTS machines and the original passimeter was removed. Deep coffered ceiling with some raised lanterns light the booking hall. To north and south, a pair of wide steps leading to the platforms are fully lined with similar tiles, the pilasters painted black.

The shops retain their deep green marble plinths below a black vitrolite band, these materials both curved at the quadrant shop fronts. Shop windows are in metal frames, with continuous transoms, some with small pane leading. Painted pilasters between shops. Some original shop glass signage in transoms.

The areas beneath the ticket office are not of special interest as the Victorian platforms have been faced with late C20 tiles.

HISTORY: This station was first opened as Willesden Green in 1879 as the temporary terminus of the Metropolitan and St. John's Wood Railway extension from West Hampstead. It was re-named Willesden Green & Cricklewood between 1894 and 1938. The station was reconstructed in 1914 with new platforms to serve fast trains. The station, originally brick-faced, was substantially rebuilt at street level in 1925 by the company architect. SUMMARY OF IMPORTANCE: A rebuilt underground station of 1925 by C.W. Clark the architect for the Metropolitan Railway Company. It is of special architectural interest for its distinctive cream terracotta facade, which Clark had used at Great Portland Street (Grade II, 1912) and Farringdon (Grade II, 1925), original lettering, integral and original shopfronts, and its well surviving ticket hall with the equally distinctive and increasingly rare sea green brick tiles. It also has historic interest as it was designed to project a strong corporate image of the inter-war development of the Metropolitan line as well as being an underground station of this date built in a traditional style just before the dramatic move to modernism that Charles Holden brought to the Piccadilly Line. The interest is concentrated at street level and the steps down to the platforms. The areas beneath this are not of interest, the Victorian platforms having been faced with late C20 tiles.

SOURCES: D. Leboff. London Underground Stations. 1994.

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:

496402

Legacy System:

LBS

Sources

Books and journals
Leboff, D, London Underground Stations, (1994)

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