Plaque

W.S. Gilbert - SW7

Erection date: 1929

Inscription

W.S. Gilbert, (1836-1911), dramatist, lived here.
LCC

Site: W.S. Gilbert - SW7 (1 memorial)

SW7, Harrington Gardens, 39

This house was designed for Gilbert by Ernest George and Harold Peto.

2018: The Telegraph included this house (in this area of astonishing architecture) in their Unsung buildings that bring Victorian London to life. They write: Gilbert "paid for it out of the profits of their light operetta Patience. ... five stately stories of mullioned windows and carved stone topped with an enormous stepped gable. Gilbert decorated the interior in the Aesthetic (or Artistic) style and filled it with exotic oriental objects, creating perhaps one of the last great hurrahs of the Aesthetic before the Arts and Crafts movement set in. Gilbert wrote the Mikado in his study here, inspired, it is said, by the clattering fall of a Japanese sword that hung above the study door. Note the stone galleon that sits at the very top of the stepped gable, a reference to Gilbert's alleged ancestor, the heroic Elizabethan sailor Sir Humphrey Gilbert."

Credit for this entry to: Alan Patient of www.plaquesoflondon.co.uk

Comments are provided by Facebook, please ensure you are signed in here to see them

This section lists the subjects commemorated on the memorial on this page:
W.S. Gilbert - SW7

Subjects commemorated i

W. S. Gilbert

Playwright, lyricist & poet. Born 17 Southampton Street as William Schwen...

Read More

This section lists the subjects who helped to create/erect the memorial on this page:
W.S. Gilbert - SW7

Created by i

London County Council

Prior to the LCC London matters were run by church parishes. The LCC was the ...

Read More

Nearby Memorials

Temple Bar - Temple Bar Trust

Temple Bar - Temple Bar Trust

EC4, Paternoster Square

There are 3 inscribed stones laid into the pavement under Temple Bar. They commemorate: The commencement of the work for the return of th...

4 subjects commemorated
Gerald du Maurier

Gerald du Maurier

NW3, Cannon Place, 14

The building, named Cannon Hall, was Daphne du Maurier's childhood home. This house and garden are the location for the denouement in th...

1 subject commemorated, 1 creator
William Petty

William Petty

W1, Fitzmaurice Place, 9

Built as Lansdowne House in 1763, designed by Robert Adam, later altered by George Dance the Younger and then by Robert Smirke, and then ...

1 subject commemorated, 1 creator
St John's church Clerkenwell - repairs

St John's church Clerkenwell - repairs

EC1, St John's Square, St John's Cloister Garden

Details of this repair work are given at British History Online. Until the post-war reconstruction it seems that these were the only sign...

1 subject commemorated
Abbotsbury Gate

Abbotsbury Gate

W8, Holland Park

Abbotsbury Gate - Holland Park Made possible by the bequest of the late Miss J. V. Pelletier - d.1988 and the Brighten Up the Borough Fun...

1 subject commemorated, 2 creators