Brass family tomb, Brompton Cemetery

Brompton Cemetery, Old Brompton Road, London, SW10

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

Overview

Headstone and ledger slab to Brass family, c.1899, with relief sculpture by A Stanley Young. Read the official list entry to find out more.

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: II
List Entry Number:: 1403338
Date first listed:: 21-Dec-2011
List Entry Name:: Brass family tomb, Brompton Cemetery
Statutory Address:: Brompton Cemetery, Old Brompton Road, London, SW10

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Official list entry

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: II
List Entry Number:: 1403338
Date first listed:: 21-Dec-2011
List Entry Name:: Brass family tomb, Brompton Cemetery
Location Description:
Statutory Address 1:: Brompton Cemetery, Old Brompton Road, London, SW10

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:: Brompton Cemetery, Old Brompton Road, London, SW10

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

County:: Greater London Authority
District:: Kensington and Chelsea (London Borough)
Parish:: Non Civil Parish
National Grid Reference:: TQ2577077691

Summary

Headstone and ledger slab to Brass family, c.1899, with relief sculpture by A Stanley Young.

Reasons for Designation

* Design interest: a large and prominent memorial in an unusual Art Nouveau-influenced style, with a relief panel of good sculptural quality; * Group value: it is located within the Grade I-registered Brompton Cemetery and has group value with other listed tombs and structures nearby.

History

The headstone commemorates the Brass family and was sculpted by A Stanley Young who was an exhibitor at the Royal Academy Summer Exhibitions of 1905, 1908, 1911 and 1912. His commissioned works include the statue of Mercury atop Willing House, Gray's Inn Road (1910) and a relief sculpture of Prudence, Justice and Liberality on the Norwich Union Assurance building, 49-50 Fleet Street, London (1913); both buildings are Grade II listed.

Brompton Cemetery was one of the 'magnificent seven' privately-run burial grounds established in the 1830s and 1840s to relieve pressure on London's overcrowded churchyards. It was laid out in 1839-1844 to designs by the architect Benjamin B Baud, who devised a classical landscape of axial drives and vistas with rond-points at the intersections marked by mausolea or ornamental planting, the latter devised by Isaac Finnemore with advice from J C Loudon. The main Ceremonial Way culminates in a dramatic architectural ensemble recalling Bernini's piazza in front of St Peter's in Rome, with flanking colonnades curving outwards to form a Great Circle, closed at its southern end in a domed Anglican chapel (the planned Catholic and Nonconformist chapels were omitted for financial reasons. The cemetery, never a commercial success, was compulsorily purchased by the General Board of Health in the early 1850s, and has remained in state ownership ever since.

Details

MATERIALS: Portland stone with bronze relief panel

A very tall (approximately 2m) headstone in Free Classical style, with supporting volutes and an upper section composed of two short Ionic pilasters beneath a segmental pediment; an inset bronze relief, dated 1899 and signed by the sculptor A Stanley Young, shows mourners by a death-bed. In front is a raised ledger slab in the form of a scroll. Moulded copings mark the boundaries of the plot, with miniature Ionic pilasters at the outer corners. Inscriptions, in Art Nouveau bronze lettering, commemorate Horace Lot (d.1896), his father Lot Brass (1854-1937), his mother Elizabeth Brass (1856-1939), and his brother, the lawyer and civil servant Sir Leslie Brass (1891-1958).

Sources

Books and journals
Pevsner, N, Cherry, B, The Buildings of England: London 3 North West, (1991), pp.470-471
Royal Academy of Arts, , Royal Academy Exhibitors 1905-1970, (1982), pp 345
Sheppard, FHW, Survey of London: Volume 41: Brompton, (1983), pp.246-252
Stevens Curl, J, The Victorian Celebration of Death, (1972), pp.112-129
Other
Brompton Cemetery Grant Books (BB158609), held at the National Archives,

Legal

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