South Kensington Living
Bolton Gardens
Bolton Gardens runs north of Old Brompton Road and also has a western leg running east from Earls Court Road.
The section just north of Old Brompton Road consists of a terrace of large white-stucco, four-storey houses (plus basement). There is a large communal garden.
The west section of Bolton Gardens also consists of large four-storey red-brick houses (plus basement) but they are mainly semi-detached and back on to the rear communal garden.
Bolton Gardens was mainly the work of the builder John Spicer. It comprises land on both sides of Old Brompton Road.
His first job was the construction of No. 9 Bolton Gardens in 1865. In 1866 he built Nos. 10-15 along the short stretch of Bolton Gardens which runs east to Old Brompton Road on the part of Bolton Gardens owned by James Gunter II. These houses are believed to have been designed by the Godwins.
The rest of Spicer’s Bolton Gardens houses were built along the main east- west line of Bolton, Gledhow and Wetherby Gardens which was then called ‘Wetherby Road’. He built No. 16 (the corner property) in 1869 and Nos 17-23 on the section opposite Collingham Gardens in 1871-3. These were also on James Gunter II’s land.
Robert Gunter II owned the rest of ‘Wetherby Road’. In 1870-1 Spicer built Nos 36-39 almost at the Earls Court Road end. He built No. 40 next to Wetherby Mews in 1875.
It is believed that the Godwins provided the designs for these ‘Wetherby Road’ houses. In style they returned to the restraint of late-Georgian street architecture, but on a larger scale and with added Victorian details. They are semi-detached houses with simple pillared porticos. The ground floor rooms are particularly high.
Nos. 41-42, very small properties adjoining Wetherby Mews, were built in 1874 by William Corbett and Alexander McClymont, the major Gunter builders in the Redcliffe estate area.
For some reason, Spicer did not join the two ‘Wetherby Road’ developments and the segment in between (opposite Bramham Gardens). He may have been put off by the failure of Corbett and McClymont to sell the houses they had built nearby in Old Brompton Road. By the late 1870s large houses were proving to be out of fashion. The land stayed vacant and was converted to use as a tennis court in 1882. The land was eventually leased to Henry Bailey who built Nos. 24-35 there between 1894 and 1896. These were again fairly big houses, so it would appear that such houses had returned to favour by the 1890s.
Nos. 1-9 Bolton Gardens were built on the south of Old Brompton Road. They were constructed by John Spicer in 1863-4. Nos. 1-6 were demolished to make way for Bousfield School. No. 8 was extended in 1876 by the architect E N Clifton.
