Grosvenor House - Brief History

Brief History

The site was occupied by a small house named 'Gloucester House' (after Prince William Henry, Duke of Gloucester and Edinburgh(d.1805) who owned it) with the front entrance on Upper Grosvenor Street. This house was purchased by Robert Grosvenor, 1st Marquess of Westminster(d.1845) in 1805 for £20,000. He spent £17,000 on extending the house to make it more fashionable with the times. In 1821, a large picture gallery 50 feet (15 m) long was added to the west of the house. It was in here that many of the Grosvenor treasures were held.

Another extension was added in 1842, in the form of a 110 feet (34 m) long classical-style colonnaded entrance screen on Upper Grosvenor Street. At each end was a triumphal arch with pediments above sculpted with the Grosvenor arms. Thomas Cundy, the architect of this vast house then proposed a larger mansion to go all the way along to Park Street extending all the way to 230 feet (70 m). This was dropped as the 2nd Marquess thought it was to be too lavish.

In 1870 Hugh Grosvenor, 3rd Marquess of Westminster(d.1899) (later the 1st Duke) commissioned Henry Clutton to add a Porte-Cochére to the north and had many of the state rooms redesigned. In 1889 electricity was introduced, being one of the first buildings in London to do so.