Montpelier Crescent to Montpelier Villas

History notes and photo gallery

Reproduced with permission from the Encyclopaedia of Brighton by Tim Carder, 1990

Please note that this text is an extract from a reference work written in 1990.  As a result, some of the content may not reflect recent research, changes and events.

f) MONTPELIER CRESCENT: In the 1830s and '40s the site of Montpelier Crescent was a cricket ground known as Lillywhite's, Lee's Trap or the Temple Fields Ground; on 29-30 August 1842 Sussex played All-England there. The crescent was erected in 1843-7 by A.H.Wilds, the grandest of his many works, and these original houses, nos.7-31, are decorated with giant fluted pilasters and either Corinthian or ammonite capitals. The wings at nos.1-6 and 32-38 were added in the 1850s, but all the houses are listed and form a magnificent sweeping crescent. {15,44,46}

g) MONTPELIER PLACE: Nos.20-24 are large, bow-fronted, listed houses of about 1855 with balconies. Listed also are no.14, bow-fronted and dating from about 1830, and the Montpelier Inn, a three-storey building of about 1849 with three bows. {44}

The principal building of Montpelier Place is the former St Stephen's Church, now a grade II*-listed building. Dedicated on 25 July 1851, the interior was reconstructed from the Royal Chapel in Palace Place which itself had been, until 1822, the ballroom of the Castle Inn, constructed originally in 1766 by John Crunden. Following the town's purchase of the Royal Pavilion estate in 1850, the chapel was claimed by the Church Commissioners as a consecrated building and removed to a new classical building by Cheesemans with pilasters, pediment, and an octagonal lantern with orb and cross. The magnificent ballroom interior, which has a shallow vaulted ceiling and urn frieze supported by columns with foliated capitals, formed a wide rectangular nave with a railed-off sanctuary. Opening on 25 July 1851, the first incumbent was Revd George Wagner whose aunt Mary Wagner provided the land. In 1889 the church was remodelled by Arthur Blomfield, and it was restored in 1908. However, St Stephen's closed in 1939 and was then used by the Diocesan Association for the Deaf and Dumb, but since 1974 has been the First Base Day Centre for the homeless. In March 1988 the interior was badly damaged by fire, but the centre reopened a year later with the interior splendidly restored. {44,45,64a,65,123,194}

Standing on the boundary between Brighton and Hove is the Baptist Tabernacle, opened on 1 April 1967 on the site of the Emmanuel Church, a Reformed Episcopal church of 1867-8 which was built in Early English style with a south-eastern tower. In the Tabernacle wall is a foundation stone laid by the Revd C.Brake on 1 May 1834 at the original Baptist Tabernacle, an Ionic-style building that stood off West Street but was demolished in 1965 with the Wagner Hall later erected on the site. {62,123}

h) MONTPELIER ROAD: Montpelier Road once ran all the way from King's Road to Ditchling Road, but the name is now restricted to the section south of Denmark Villas. It was developed from the 1820s in what was considered the most salubrious area of the town and the houses were consequently of a high-class nature with many now listed. The most distinctive are nos.53-56, designed by A.H.Wilds with fluted ammonite pilasters and shell decorations, and nos.91-96, small villas of about 1830 with Ionic doorways, possibly by A.Wilds and Busby. No.90 is notable on account of its cast-iron and stained-glass porch. Other listed houses north of Western Road include nos.51-52, 58-65, 70-74, 76-80, and the unstuccoed nos.36-42; all have late-Regency, wide bow-fronted fa..cs.ades of around 1840. Nos.48-50, with narrow bows, are also listed. No.60 was the home of Revd F.W.Robertson (see "Montpelier Terrace" below) from 1850 until 1853. {44,46,64a,75}

Park Royal, once a private block of flats but purchased by the council in about 1974, stands on the site of Belvedere, a Jacobean-style house erected in about 1840 for Mary Wagner who lived in the adjacent vicarage with her brother Revd Henry Wagner. Now only the garden walls of Belvedere remain, at Belvedere Terrace and in Montpelier Road where the wall is a listed structure. The house was let as a girls' school, but on Mary Wagner's death it passed to her nephew Arthur Wagner who lived there from 1870 until 1902. It was later converted into the Park Royal Court Hotel, but was demolished in 1965. {65,123}

The unlisted First Church of Christ Scientist, to the south of Montpelier Terrace, has an elaborately decorated pediment but was originally a private house, obviously so from the rear. It was built in about 1850 and converted into a church in 1921 when the sect moved from the Athenaeum Hall in North Street. {62,83}

j) MONTPELIER STREET: An attractive listed terrace of small, mostly bow-fronted houses of about 1845 lines the western side. No.40, with a wide bow on the eastern side of the road, is also listed. {44}

k) MONTPELIER TERRACE: Nos.1-7, together with no.89 Montpelier Road, form a listed three-storey terrace dating from about 1830 with balconies and Ionic pilasters, although nos.6-7 were added in about 1850. No.1 has a plaque to Ray Noble, the former bandleader and composer who was born there in 1903. Nos.8-13 are a terrace of listed villas with balconies and verandahs of about 1840; the Revd F.W.Robertson, famed for his preaching at Holy Trinity and for founding the Brighton Working Men's Institute, lived at no.9 from 1847 until 1850. No.14 won a council award in 1983 for its restoration. On the southern side of the road, the red-brick no.16 dates from about 1830, has a fanlight doorway, and is listed along with the late-Regency no.17, Montpellier Hall, of about 1850. {44}

l) MONTPELIER VILLAS: A road lined with delightful, semi-detached Italianate villas, all listed buildings with ironwork balconies and verandahs. Dating from about 1845, they are said to have been built on the site of a bluebell wood and many bluebells still grow in the gardens. No.20 was the home of television personality Gilbert Harding in the 1950s. {3,44,83}
Any numerical cross-references in the text above refer to resources in the Sources and Bibliography section of the Encyclopaedia of Brighton by Tim Carder.