Portland Place is a street in the Marylebone and Fitzrovia district of central London, England. It was laid out by the brothers Robert and James Adam for the Duke of Portland in the late 18th century and originally ran north from the gardens of a detached mansion called Foley House. It was said that the width of the street was conditioned by the Duke's obligation to his tenant, Lord Foley, that his views to the north would not be interfered with.
In the early 19th century Portland Place was incorporated into the royal route from Carlton House to Regent's Park developed for the Prince Regent by John Nash. The street is unusually wide for central London (33 metres / 110 feet; Norrie & Bohm. It still contains many of the spacious Georgian terraced houses built by the Adams,as well as some early 20th century buildings and a few post World War II bombing infills. Many of the houses are now occupied by company headquarters, professional bodies, embassies and charities (including the Royal Air Force Benevolent Fund at No 67). The landmark building of Royal Institute of British Architects sits directly opposite the Chinese embassy; for years practitioners of Falun Gong have mounted a silent protest in front of the former and facing the latter. In addition, Portland Place remains a fashionable address with some very exclusive blocks of mansion flats.
Its northern end opens into Nash's elegant stucco semicircular Park Crescent, which in turn leads on to Park Square and Regent's Park. There are two landmark buildings at the south end of the street, although both are technically in Langham Place: the grand late Victorian Langham Hotel, and BBC Broadcasting House. Langham Place is a short road which connects Portland Place to Upper Regent Street, although on the ground they all appear to be one street.
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Literary references
- Portland Place was the home of Jane Gamble, the character on whom Henry James based his novel 'Portrait of a Lady'.
- Jane Gamble was also the real-life subject of 'My Courtship and its Consequences' by Henry Wikoff.
- Portland Place was the London address of Adam Verver and his wife, the former Charlotte Stant, in the last complete major novel by Henry James, The Golden Bowl.
- Portland place is the home of Richard Hannay in John Buchan's novel The Thirty-nine Steps
- Portland place is the home of Stephen Jones in H. P. Lovecraft's short story The Horror in the Museum
See also
References
- Georgian London (1945) by Sir John Summerson ISBN 0-7126-2095-8
- Norrie, Ian; Bohm, Dorothy (1984). Walks Around London - A Celebration of the Capital. London: Andre Deutsch. ISBN 0-233-97979-4.
External links
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