Wykeham Terrace is a row of 12 early 19th-century houses in central Brighton, part of the English city of Brighton and Hove. The Tudor-Gothic building, attributed to prominent local architect Amon Henry Wilds, is built into the hillside below the churchyard of Brighton's ancient parish church. Uses since its completion in 1830 have included a home for former prostitutes and a base for the Territorial Army, but the terrace is now exclusively residential again. Its "charming" architecture is unusual in Brighton, whose 19th-century buildings are predominantly in the Regency style. English Heritage has listed the terrace at Grade II for its architectural and historical importance.
St Nicholas' Church, Brighton's oldest Christian place of worship and its parish church until 1873,[1] stands on a hill well behind the English Channel coast on which the old fishing village of Brighthelmston developed. French raids during the 16th century damaged or destroyed much of the settlement, and only the church survived unscathed.[2][3] Decline set in until the mid-18th century, when the good climate, patronage by wealthy, fashionable visitors, better transport and the growth of the sea-bathing and "water cure" fad transformed Brighthelmston into the popular resort of Brighton.[2][4]
Residential development proceeded rapidly around the core of the fishing village. Amon Henry Wilds, his father Amon Wilds and another architect, Charles Busby, were the most important builders and designers in Brighton's early 19th-century growth period: they worked jointly or individually on dozens of residential, religious and secular buildings and developed Brighton's characteristic Regency style.[5] In 1827, Amon Henry Wilds is believed to have been commissioned to design Wykeham Terrace (although this attribution has not been established definitively).[6] The site, east of the road from central Brighton to Devil's Dyke on the South Downs, was dug into the hillside on which St Nicholas' churchyard stands.[6] The terrace was completed in 1830.[7]
In the 1850s, 325 prostitutes (including 25 children) and 97 brothels were recorded in Brighton, and these were known to be underestimates.[8] In 1853, Rev. George Wagner of St Stephen's Church, a cousin of Rev. Arthur Wagner (curate and later vicar of St Paul's Church),[9] established a house on the town's Lewes Road to which prostitutes could be sent by police and doctors to be helped and rehabilitated.[8][9][10] Only 12 women could be accommodated in this building, so in 1855 Wagner bought houses in Wykeham Terrace and the adjacent Queen Square and expanded the institution. In 1857, after George Wagner died, Arthur Wagner himself took over responsibility for the home, by way of the Community of the Virgin Mary—a Brighton-based convent which he had founded. They renamed the institution St Mary's Home for Female Penitents, and expanded it further to take in all of Wykeham Terrace apart from numbers 6, 7 and 12.[9] The west side of Queen Square, whose buildings backed on to the terrace, was also occupied. Although conditions for the former prostitutes were strict, with regular surveillance, hard work and punishments for misbehaviour,[11] the institution was able to offer about 40 women proper healthcare, education, training for domestic service, and charitable help of various kinds.[8]Constance Kent, convicted of an infamous child murder in 1865 in a case which revolved around priest–penitent privilege, worked at the Home during this time.[11] By the 1880s, the Home expanded further to take in disabled, elderly and destitute women from around Brighton, and orphans: nearly 300 people lived there. The institution moved in part to Egremont Place in the Queen's Park area in 1866, and in its entirety to Rottingdean in 1912. (The building provided for it there is now residential, but the community of nuns survives in Rottingdean, an outlying village which is now part of the city of Brighton and Hove.)[9]
The terrace returned to residential use after that, but the Army owned some of the houses at one point in the 20th century and turned them into quarters for married soldiers. The whole terrace was then bought by the Territorial Army, again to provide housing for their soldiers. Squatters took over in the 1960s, and the Territorial Army sold the building to a developer for refurbishment and conversion back to private houses and flats.[9] This took place during 1970.[12]
Notable residents have included actress Dame Flora Robson, who lived at number 7 in the last years of her life;[12] art historian Sir Roy Strong; singer-songwriter David Courtney; and singer Adam Faith. Courtney wrote many songs for Leo Sayer at his flat, and Faith managed the singer.[9]
Wykeham Terrace was listed at Grade II by English Heritage on 4 July 1969.[7] This status is given to "nationally important buildings of special interest".[13] As of February 2001, it was one of 1,124 Grade II-listed buildings and structures, and 1,218 listed buildings of all grades, in the city of Brighton and Hove.[14]
Architecture
The five-sided centre bay is topped by a decorative parapet.
As a non-ecclesiastical Gothic-style building, Wykeham Terrace is almost unique in Brighton: the remnants of Gothic House in Western Road (now part of a shop), built by Amon Henry Wilds, and the Percy and Wagner Almshouses on Lewes Road, are the only other examples.[15][16] It has been called a "charming Gothic confection",[6] and is generally considered "attractive"[10][12] and "pleasant".[11] The curious styling is described as Tudor-Gothic[7] (with "Tudor" reflecting the brief 19th-century revival of the original Tudor form), but Nikolaus Pevsner and Ian Nairn considered it Gothic above all,[17] and the description "Regency-Gothic" has also been used in view of some Regency-style elements.[9][10]
The whole terrace is faced with grey-painted cement and stucco. The mansard roof, with dormer windows, is laid with slate.[17][7] The long façade is symmetrical but uneven in height: the houses have either two or three storeys with a basement. At the south and north ends, three-sided bays project forwards and are topped by pinnacles.[6][7] In the centre, forming part of numbers 7 and 8, a similar polygonal bay projects from the terrace to form its centrepiece.[7] Except on these bays, all windows are paired lancets with flat hood moulds, some of which retain their unusual diamond-pattern bars.[6][7][12] The central, five-sided bay is of three storeys, with a large pointed-arched lancet window at the top; a gable cuts into the decorative parapet above it, and buttresses on each side terminate in flat-topped projections.[7]
Antram, Nicholas; Morrice, Richard (2008). Brighton and Hove. Pevsner Architectural Guides. London: Yale University Press. ISBN978-0-300-12661-7.
Brighton Polytechnic. School of Architecture and Interior Design (1987). A Guide to the Buildings of Brighton. Macclesfield: McMillan Martin. ISBN1-869865-03-0.
Carder, Timothy (1990). The Encyclopaedia of Brighton. Lewes: East Sussex County Libraries. ISBN0-86147-315-9.
Collis, Rose (2010). The New Encyclopaedia of Brighton. (based on the original by Tim Carder) (1sted.). Brighton: Brighton & Hove Libraries. ISBN978-0-9564664-0-2.
There are 24 Grade I listed buildings in the city of Brighton and Hove, England. The city, on the English Channel coast approximately 52 miles (84 km) south of London, was formed as a unitary authority in 1997 by the merger of the neighbouring towns of Brighton and Hove. Queen Elizabeth II granted city status in 2000.
Amon Henry Wilds was an English architect. He was part of a team of three architects and builders who—working together or independently at different times—were almost solely responsible for a surge in residential construction and development in early 19th-century Brighton, which until then had been a small but increasingly fashionable seaside resort on the East Sussex coast. In the 1820s, when Wilds, his father Amon Wilds and Charles Busby were at their most active, nearly 4,000 new houses were built, along with many hotels, churches and venues for socialising; most of these still survive, giving Brighton a distinctive Regency-era character, and many are listed buildings.
Amon Wilds was an English architect and builder. He formed an architectural partnership with his son Amon Henry Wilds in 1806 and started working in the fashionable and growing seaside resort of Brighton, on the East Sussex coast, in 1815. After 1822, when the father-and-son partnership met and joined up with Charles Busby, they were commissioned—separately or jointly—to design a wide range of buildings in the town, which was experiencing an unprecedented demand for residential development and other facilities. Wilds senior also carried out much work on his own, but the description "Wilds and Busby" was often used on designs, making individual attribution difficult. Wilds senior and his partners are remembered most for his work in post-Regency Brighton, where most of their houses, churches and hotels built in a bold Regency style remain—in particular, the distinctive and visionary Kemp Town and Brunswick estates on the edges of Brighton, whose constituent parts are Grade I listed buildings.
There are 72 Grade II* listed buildings in the city of Brighton and Hove, England. The city, on the English Channel coast approximately 52 miles (84 km) south of London, was formed as a unitary authority in 1997 by the merger of the neighbouring towns of Brighton and Hove. Queen Elizabeth II granted city status in 2000.
Mathematical tiles are tiles which were used extensively as a building material in the southeastern counties of England—especially East Sussex and Kent—in the 18th and early 19th centuries. They were laid on the exterior of timber-framed buildings as an alternative to brickwork, which their appearance closely resembled. A distinctive black variety with a glazed surface was used on many buildings in Brighton from about 1760 onwards, and is considered a characteristic feature of the town's early architecture. Although the brick tax (1784–1850) was formerly thought to have encouraged use of mathematical tiles, in fact the tiles were subject to the same tax.
Sussex Heights is a residential tower block in the centre of Brighton, part of the English city of Brighton and Hove. Built between 1966 and 1968 on the site of a historic church, it rises to 102 m (335 ft) and has 116 flats. As of August 2022, the tower is the 125th tallest building in the UK, and until 2005 it was the tallest residential tower in the UK outside of London. Until 2015, it was the tallest structure in Brighton, however it has now been exceeded by the i360 Tower, which stands at 162 metres.
The Clock Tower is a free-standing clock tower in the centre of Brighton, part of the English city of Brighton and Hove. Built in 1888 in commemoration of Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee, the distinctive structure included innovative structural features and became a landmark in the popular and fashionable seaside resort. The city's residents "retain a nostalgic affection" for it, even though opinion is sharply divided as to the tower's architectural merit. English Heritage has listed the clock tower at Grade II for its architectural and historical importance.
The Western Pavilion is an exotically designed early 19th-century house in the centre of Brighton, part of the English city of Brighton and Hove. Local architect Amon Henry Wilds, one of the most important figures in Brighton's development from modest fishing village to fashionable seaside resort, built the distinctive two-storey house between 1827 and 1828 as his own residence, and incorporated many inventive details while paying homage to the Royal Pavilion, Brighton's most famous and distinctive building. Although the house has been altered and a shopfront inserted, it is still in residential use, and has been listed at Grade II* by English Heritage for its architectural and historical importance.
As of February 2001, there were 1,124 listed buildings with Grade II status in the English city of Brighton and Hove. The total at 2009 was similar. The city, on the English Channel coast approximately 52 miles (84 km) south of London, was formed as a unitary authority in 1997 by the merger of the neighbouring towns of Brighton and Hove. Queen Elizabeth II granted city status in 2000.
Park Crescent is a mid-19th-century residential development in the Round Hill area of Brighton, part of the English city of Brighton and Hove. The horseshoe-shaped, three-part terrace of 48 houses was designed and built by one of Brighton's most important architects, Amon Henry Wilds; by the time work started in 1849 he had 35 years' experience in the town. Wilds used the Italianate style rather than his more common Regency motifs. Three houses were replaced after the Second World War because of bomb damage, and another was the scene of one of Brighton's notorious "trunk murders" of the 1930s. The three parts of the terrace, which encircle a private garden formerly a pleasure ground and cricket pitch, have been listed at Grade II* by English Heritage for their architectural and historical importance.
Brighton and Hove, a city on the English Channel coast in southeast England, has a large and diverse stock of buildings "unrivalled architecturally" among the country's seaside resorts. The urban area, designated a city in 2000, is made up of the formerly separate towns of Brighton and Hove, nearby villages such as Portslade, Patcham and Rottingdean, and 20th-century estates such as Moulsecoomb and Mile Oak. The conurbation was first united in 1997 as a unitary authority and has a population of about 253,000. About half of the 20,430-acre (8,270 ha) geographical area is classed as built up.
Thomas Lainson, FRIBA was a British architect. He is best known for his work in the East Sussex coastal towns of Brighton and Hove, where several of his eclectic range of residential, commercial and religious buildings have been awarded listed status by English Heritage. Working alone or in partnership with two sons as Lainson & Sons, he designed buildings in a wide range of styles, from Neo-Byzantine to High Victorian Gothic; his work is described as having a "solid style, typical of the time".
Round Hill is an inner suburban area of Brighton, part of the coastal city of Brighton and Hove in England. The area contains a mix of privately owned and privately rented terraced housing, much of which has been converted for multiple occupancies, and small-scale commercial development. It was developed mostly in the late 19th century on an area of high land overlooking central Brighton and with good views in all directions, the area became a desirable middle-class suburb—particularly the large terraced houses of Roundhill Crescent and Richmond Road, and the exclusive Park Crescent—and within a few decades the whole of the hill had been built up with smaller terraces and some large villas.
Roundhill Crescent is a late-19th-century housing development in Round Hill, an inner suburb of the English coastal city of Brighton and Hove. Partly developed in the 1860s with large terraced houses on a steeply sloping open hillside, the crescent—which "curves and changes height dramatically along its length"—was finished two decades later and now forms the centrepiece of the Round Hill conservation area. Smaller houses completed the composition in the 1880s, and England's first hospital for the treatment of mental illness was founded in the crescent in 1905. The five original sets of houses from the 1860s have been listed at Grade II by English Heritage for their architectural and historical importance, and the crescent occupies a prominent place on Brighton's skyline.
Montpelier is an inner suburban area of Brighton, part of the English city and seaside resort of Brighton and Hove. Developed together with the adjacent Clifton Hill area in the mid-19th century, it forms a high-class, architecturally cohesive residential district with "an exceptionally complete character". Stucco-clad terraced housing and villas predominate, but two of the city's most significant Victorian churches and a landmark hospital building are also in the area, which lies immediately northwest of Brighton city centre and spreads as far as the ancient parish boundary with Hove.
Montpelier Crescent is a mid 19th-century crescent of 38 houses in the Montpelier suburb of Brighton, part of the English coastal city of Brighton and Hove. Built in five parts as a set-piece residential development in the rapidly growing seaside resort, the main part of the crescent was designed between 1843 and 1847 by prominent local architect Amon Henry Wilds and is one of his most distinctive compositions. Extra houses were added at both ends of the crescent in the mid-1850s. Unlike most other squares, terraces and crescents in Brighton, it does not face the sea—and the view it originally had towards the South Downs was blocked within a few years by a tall terrace of houses opposite. Montpelier was an exclusive and "salubrious" area of Brighton, and Montpelier Crescent has been called its "great showpiece". Wilds's central section has been protected as Grade II* listed, with the later additions listed separately at the lower Grade II. The crescent is in one of the city's 34 conservation areas, and forms one of several "outstanding examples of late Regency architecture" within it.
Clayton & Black were a firm of architects and surveyors from Brighton, part of the English city of Brighton and Hove. In a career spanning the Victorian, Edwardian and interwar eras, they were responsible for designing and constructing an eclectic range of buildings in the growing town of Brighton and its neighbour Hove. Their work encompassed new residential, commercial, industrial and civic buildings, shopping arcades, churches, schools, cinemas and pubs, and alterations to hotels and other buildings. Later reconstituted as Clayton, Black & Daviel, the company designed some churches in the postwar period.
Gothic House is a Gothic-style building in the centre of Brighton, part of the English city of Brighton and Hove. Although it has been in commercial use for more than a century, it retains some of its original appearance as "one of the most fascinating houses" built by the prolific partnership of Amon Henry Wilds and Charles Busby. It is the only Gothic Revival building they are known to have designed: they typically adopted the Regency style, sometimes with Classical or Italianate touches. The building is Grade II listed.
The Percy and Wagner Almshouses are a group of 12 almshouses in the inner-city Hanover area of the English coastal city of Brighton and Hove. The first six date from 1795 and are among the few pre-19th-century buildings left in the city. Six more were added in a matching style in 1859. They are the only surviving almshouses in Brighton and have been listed at Grade II for their architectural and historical importance.
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