Westminster Bridge House, Lambeth

Image: © PAUL FARMER Taken: 1 Sep 2012

Former office block of the London Necropolis Company Terminus. Dated 1900. By Cyril B Tubbs, general manager of the Necropolis Company, and Mr Andrews, engineer, of the London and South-West Railway. Brick, with granite base to the street facade, terracotta detailing and slate roof. Four storeys with a fifth in the mansard roof; mezzanine inserted in second half of C20. The ground floor consists of a massive segmental arch in grey granite with moulded chamfering and an elaborately carved keystone, under a fascia said to be inscribed 'LONDON NECROPOLIS'. The first, second and third floors are faced with rusticated brickwork; the central windows of the first and second floors are framed by a centrepiece consisting, on the first floor, of four engaged columns and entablature, in terracotta and, on the second floor of two pairs of square columns each consisting of brickwork and terracotta quoins, and each pair supporting a 'stilted' pediment decorated with a cartouche and fronds of Art Nouveau ornament. The third floor is topped by a massive semicircular pediment, elaborately detailed in terracotta, and embracing the whole width of the facade. A semicircular panel of ornament in the tympanum bears the date '1900'. Interior: Architraves of original design survive round the doors and windows on the first and second floors. This building originally formed the street frontage for the London Necropolis Company's Terminus; the other buildings, which extended to the south and west as far as Newnham Terrace, have been demolished in the 1940s. J M Clarke, The Brookwood Necropolis Railway, 1988.

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