Description

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635-1/0/10152

CHARTERHOUSE SQUARE
Nos. 6-9 (Florin Court)

02-SEP-03

GV
II

Block of 126 flats. 1936 to the designs of Guy Morgan and Partners. Steel-framed building, with concrete floors. Portland stone plinth, with yellow brick above, laid in Flemish bond; flat roof (sun terrace) concealed behind parapet. Ten storeys over basement. The building has a recessed centre and projecting wings with curved corners, with setbacks on the ninth and tenth floors.

Eleven window range. The runs of metal casement windows follow the curves of the building, and are grouped into bands by exposed concrete surrounds. Central entrance, with curved Portland stone dwarf flanking walls, and canopy with curved and indented profile and metal fascia, flat arched entrance to underground garage in south bay. The brick work to the first and second floors, and to the piers between windows rusticated by projection of alternate course. Stylised cartouche and ribbons in brown brick over the central first floor windows; cornice to eighth floor. Wrought iron railings to area and gates to garage entrance with decorative double curves.

Interior understood to retain simplified entrance hall with doors and signage; staircases with decorative iron balustrading.

Best known as 'Whitehaven Mansions', its exterior used as the residence of Hercule Poirot in the television adaptations of Agatha Christie's novels. It is one of three exceptional blocks by the architect Guy Morgan, who set up in private practice in 1927 having worked for Sir Edwin Lutyens but who rapidly came to design in a sophisticated modern style.

Sources

Architect and Building News, 30 July 1937, pp.1443-6

Daily Telegraph, 30 October 1987

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Florin Court at Wikipedia
• Wikidata Q5461830

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  For the Record
• 
  London 6: Westminster (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England): Westminster v. 6
• 
  Hampshire: South (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Pioneers of Modern Design: From William Morris to Walter Gropius (Penguin Art & Architecture)
• 
  Hertfordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Devon (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)