Portland Road is a road in Notting Hill, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea that was built as a speculative development in the 1850s. The road has been noted for its division into three sections of different wealth: the section between Holland Park Avenue and Clarendon Cross/Hippodrome Place being one of the most expensive places to buy a house in London, a section of terraced houses further north being also very expensive but less so than the lower reaches of the road, and a section at the northern end that was once slums and is now working class social housing and is described as being north of an "invisible line" that divides it from the privately owned sections of the road.
The road runs from Clarendon Road in the north to Holland Park Avenue in the south and is crossed by Hippodrome Place and Clarendon Cross. It is joined on its western side by Penzance Place and Pottery Lane, and on its eastern side by Ladbroke Road. The part above Clarendon Cross was originally known as Montpellier Terrace and the part north of that as Portland Road North. The houses on the west side in the southern end of the road were originally known as Portland Gardens.
Portland Road was built by speculative developers in the 1850s on a strip of land between the affluent Ladbroke Estate to the east and the Norland Estate to the west, home to the Potteries and Piggeries, one of the most notorious slums in London. [1] [2] At first all the houses were rented and in the southern part occupied by well-off tenants with households of more modest means further north.
Winterbourne House was built between the wars in the northern part of the road behind Heathfield Street as part of the clearance of what was by then slum housing. It was partly occupied by people who worked in the adjacent Notting Hill Brewery. In the late 1930s, the far larger Nottingwood House was built at the far northern end of the road on the site of the brewery and slum housing. [3]
In the twentieth century the road began to decline with most of the houses being in multiple occupation. Notting Hill slum landlord Peter Rachman owned property in the road.
From the 1960s the road began to be colonised by the middle classes again. In the later twentieth century, the road was blocked to vehicle traffic immediately below the junction with Hippodrome Place and Clarendon Cross, an action which has been seen as crystallising the class differences between the northern and the southern parts of the road. By the early twenty-first century, the southern end of the road had become a "ghetto" for bankers and it has been used as a case study of the gentrification of London streets. [4]
The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea (RBKC) is an Inner London borough with royal status. It is the smallest borough in London and the second smallest district in England; it is one of the most densely populated administrative regions in the United Kingdom. It includes affluent areas such as Notting Hill, Kensington, South Kensington, Chelsea, and Knightsbridge.
Notting Hill is a district of West London, England, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. Notting Hill is known for being a cosmopolitan and multicultural neighbourhood, hosting the annual Notting Hill Carnival and Portobello Road Market. From around 1870, Notting Hill had an association with artists.
Notting Hill Gate is a London Underground station near Notting Hill, London, located on the street called Notting Hill Gate. On the Central line, it is between Holland Park to the west and Queensway to the east. On the District line and Circle line, it is between High Street Kensington and Bayswater stations. It is on the boundary of Travelcard Zone 1 and Zone 2.
Shepherd's Bush is a district of West London, England, within the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham 4.9 miles (7.9 km) west of Charing Cross, and identified as a major metropolitan centre in the London Plan.
The Westway is a 2.5-mile (4 km) elevated dual carriageway section of the A40 trunk road in West London running from Paddington in the east to North Kensington in the west. It connects the London Inner Ring Road to the West London suburbs.
Portobello Road is a street in the Notting Hill district of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in west London. It runs almost the length of Notting Hill from south to north, roughly parallel with Ladbroke Grove. On Saturdays it is home to Portobello Road Market, one of London's notable street markets, known for its second-hand clothes, pastries and antiques. Every August since 1996, the Portobello Film Festival has been held in locations around Portobello Road and in 2015, Portobello Radio was founded as the area's community radio station.
Ladbroke Grove is a road in West London in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, running north–south between Harrow Road and Holland Park Avenue. It is also a name given to the immediate surrounding areas of Notting Hill, North Kensington, Latimer Road, Kensal Green and Westbourne Park straddling the W10 and W11 postal districts although parts of the wider area cover parts of NW10. Ladbroke Grove tube station is located on the road, at the point where it is crossed by the Westway. It is the nearest tube station to Portobello Road Market. The adjacent bridge and nearby section of the Westway were regenerated in 2007 in a partnership including Urban Eye, Transport for London and London Underground. Ladbroke Grove is the main road on the route of the annual Notting Hill Carnival. The northern tip between the Harrow Road and the iron bridge is located in Kensal Green, the middle section between Barlby road and the flyover is in north Kensington with the southern end between Lancaster road and Holland Park Avenue situated in Notting Hill.
Hunslet is an inner-city area in south Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. It is 1 mile (1.6 km) southeast of the city centre and has an industrial past.
Westbourne Grove is a retail road running across Notting Hill, an area of west London. Its western end is in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and its eastern end is in the City of Westminster; it runs from Kensington Park Road in the west to Queensway in the east, crossing over Portobello Road. It contains a mixture of independent and chain retailers, and has been termed both "fashionable" and "up-and-coming".
Notting Hill Gate is one of the main thoroughfares of Notting Hill, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. Historically the street was a location for toll gates, from which it derives its modern name.
North Kensington is an area of west London. It is north of Notting Hill and south of Kensal Green and in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. The names North Kensington and Ladbroke Grove describe the same area. Despite its namesake, it is not actually part of the larger district of Kensington from which it is separated by Notting Hill town centre.
The A40 is a major trunk road connecting London to Fishguard, Wales. The A40 in London passes through seven London Boroughs: the City of London, Camden, Westminster, Kensington & Chelsea, Hammersmith & Fulham, Ealing and Hillingdon, to meet the M40 motorway junction 1 at Denham, Buckinghamshire.
St John's Notting Hill is a Victorian Anglican church built in 1845 in Lansdowne Crescent, Notting Hill, London, designed by the architects John Hargrave Stevens (1805/6–1857) and George Alexander (1810–1885), and built in the Victorian Gothic style. Dedicated to St John the Evangelist, the church was originally built as the centrepiece of the Ladbroke Estate, a mid nineteenth century housing development designed to attract upper- and upper middle-class residents to what was then a largely rural neighbourhood in the western suburbs of London.
The Kensington Hippodrome was a racecourse built in Notting Hill, London, in 1837, by entrepreneur John Whyte. Whyte leased 140 acres (0.57 km2) of land from James Weller Ladbroke, owner of the Ladbroke Estate, and proceeded to enclose "the slopes of Notting Hill and the meadows west of Westbourne Grove" with a 7-foot (2.1 m) high wooden paling. The race course was not a financial success and it closed in 1842, the land being developed soon afterwards, as Ladbroke began building crescents of houses on Whyte's former race course.
The Ladbroke Estate was a substantial estate of land owned by the Ladbroke family in Notting Hill, London, England, in the early 19th century that was gradually developed and turned into housing during the middle years of the century, as London expanded. Characterized by terraces of stuccoed brick houses backing onto large private garden squares, much of the original building remains intact today, and now forms the heart of one of London's most expensive and fashionable neighbourhoods.
James Weller Ladbroke was a nineteenth-century landowner and the principal developer of the Ladbroke Estate, a substantial parcel of land in Notting Hill, London, England. Many streets in Notting Hill still bear the Ladbroke name today, including Ladbroke Grove and Ladbroke Square, and the former Ladbroke Estate is now a conservation area.
Pottery Lane is a street in Notting Hill, west London. Today it forms part of one of London's most fashionable and expensive neighbourhoods, but in the mid-19th century it lay at the heart of a wretched and notorious slum known as the "Potteries and the Piggeries". The slum came to the attention of Londoners with the building of the Hippodrome in 1837 by entrepreneur John Whyte. Unfortunately for Whyte a public right of way existed over his land and "dirty and dissolute vagabonds" from the nearby slum invaded his race-course, adding to his financial difficulties and, in part, leading to the closure of his venture in 1842. Pottery Lane gradually improved in the late 20th century along with the rest of the Notting Hill area, today the houses fetch multi-million pound prices. Just one of the original brick kilns still survives; it is located in Walmer road, just north of Pottery Lane, and bears a commemorative plaque placed there by the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea.
Ladbroke Square is a garden square in Notting Hill, west London, England.
Elgin Crescent is a street in Notting Hill, London, England.
Lancaster Road (West) Estate is a housing estate in North Kensington, west London.
Media related to Portland Road, Notting Hill at Wikimedia Commons