Dolphin Square
Dolphin Square is an estate of private flats with some ground floor business units near the River Thames in Pimlico, Westminster, London built between 1935 and 1937. Until the building of Highbury Square, it was the most developed garden square in London built as private housing. At one time, it was home to more than 70 MPs and at least 10 Lords.[1]
At the time of its construction, its 1,250 upmarket flats were billed by Sir Nikolaus Pevsner as the "largest self-contained block of flats in Europe". To an extent, their design has been a model for later municipal developments.[2]
Architecture[edit]
Costains appointed the architect Gordon Jeeves to design Dolphin Square and he was assisted by Cecil Eve. Oscar Faber was the consultant engineer. Up to that point, Dolphin Square was Jeeves's largest project and he had played a part in designing other London buildings such as the National Radiator Building and later at Berkeley Square House. Dolphin Square is a neo-Georgian[10] building and has a reinforced concrete structure with external facings of brick and stone. Original sound proofing was provided by compressed cork insulation in the floors. The original cost for the construction of Dolphin Square and its 1,310 flats was around £2,000,000.[11] In total, it was estimated that 200,000 tonnes of earth was moved, 125,000 tons of concrete used, 12 million bricks used on the external walls and 6,700 Crittal windows installed during construction.[12]
When it opened it had flats varying in size from one-bedroom suites to flats with five bedrooms, a maid's room and three bathrooms. Onsite facilities provided for residents when completed included shops, a children's centre and nursery, library and, in the basement, a garage for up to 300 cars.[11] The planned riverside wharf, which would have included a cafe, marina and a terraced garden leading from Grosvenor Road to the Thames, was never built.[13]
The 3.5 acres (1.4 ha) of communal gardens were designed by Richard Sudell, president of the Institute of Landscape Architects, and since 2018 are (unlike the building) Grade II listed.[10] The gardens are a mix of formal and informal planting with expanses of lawn, with areas themed to reflect garden styles from different parts of the world. The gardens and buildings form part of the Dolphin Square conservation area.[14]
In popular culture[edit]
Scenes in the 1967 sci-fi horror The Sorcerers were filmed in and around Dolphin Square.[27]
The video for Culture Club's 1982 UK number one single "Do You Really Want to Hurt Me", was set, but not filmed, at the Dolphin Pool.[28] The pool in the video is of a different architectural style, visibly not the Dolphin Pool.[29]
In British novelist Kate Atkinson's 2018 spy novel Transcription, MI5 runs a small counterespionage operation from Nelson House in Dolphin Square.