Grosvenor House
Grosvenor House was one of the largest townhouses in London, home of the Grosvenor family for more than a century. Their original London residence was on Millbank, but after the family had developed their Mayfair estates, they moved to Park Lane to build a house worthy of their wealth, status and influence in the 19th century. The house gave its name to Upper Grosvenor Street and Grosvenor Square.
The house was requisitioned during the First World War, and was sold and demolished in the 1920s. The Grosvenor House Hotel was built on its site.
History
The site was originally occupied by a small house named 'Gloucester House', with the front entrance on Upper Grosvenor Street. This house was purchased by Robert Grosvenor, 1st Marquess of Westminster, in 1805 for £20,000. He spent £17,000 on extending the house to make it more fashionable. In 1821, a large picture gallery long was added to the west of the house. It was here that many of the Grosvenor family's treasures were held.Another extension was added in 1842, in the form of a 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. This idea was dropped, as the 2nd Marquess thought it would be too lavish.
In 1870, Hugh Grosvenor, 3rd Marquess of Westminster commissioned Henry Clutton to add a porte-cochère to the north, and he had many of the state rooms redesigned. In 1889, electricity was introduced, being one of the first buildings in London to do so.
Demolition
Grosvenor House continued to be the London residence of the Dukes of Westminster in the early years of the 20th century. Following the outbreak of the First World War, the House was closed as a private residence by December 1916, and was requisitioned for wartime use by the British Government, and later leased to the United States for use as the American Embassy.From 1917 the House's owner, Hugh Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster used another Grosvenor Property, Bourdon House on Davies Street in Mayfair, which remained as his London home for the rest of his life.