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A Home with a History: close encounters with the 18th century in Spitalfields House

 

A Home with a History: close encounters with the 18th century in Spitalfields House

https://inigo.com/almanac/home-with-a-history-phillip-lucas-spitalfields-house

 

In a double-fronted house in Spitalfields, overlooked by sparkling skyscrapers, lawyer Phillip Lucas has fulfilled his dream of recreating an 18th-century house in painstaking detail. Were it not for the radiators, you’d hardly know you weren’t jostling with the Georgians

 

“I love drabs,” exclaims Phillip Lucas. He is standing in his house in east London, surrounded by glinting foxed mirrors and giltwood frames. Elsewhere, paintings of pink-pouted boys in scarlet frock coats vie for attention with burr-walnut bureaus and giltwood torchères. The heart stops as often as the eye does in this temple of beautiful, precious things, which makes this lawyer’s soft spot for sludgy colours a tad surprising, until you take in the setting. This former merchant’s house in Spitalfields has been restored – uncompromisingly, exactingly – to its 18th-century origins, drabs and all.

 

Phillip has spent a decade forensically restoring a building that, when he bought it, was barely recognisable as having anything worth saving. Now everything is, if not original to the house, then contemporary to it (save, of course, for the odd light switch and radiator. We can forgive him the odd mod con).

 

Was it love that got him here? Obsession? It was likely a bit of both, though it is Phillip’s determination and his deep understanding of the period that has made it possible. Without architects, he has somehow recreated an 18th-century house so perfectly one can almost hear the stairs creaking under the feet of former occupants. An incorrigible collector, he has amassed a wealth of coeval treasures along the way, so plentiful it has rather outgrown his home. Much will be going under the hammer at Dreweatts on 2 December; yet more is for sale on the website Phillip has launched with antique dealer Sam Wadham, straightforwardly called Spitalfields House. Showing Inigo around, he waxes lyrical about the joys and pitfalls, the challenges and romance of engineering this atavistic encounter with the past. “We all need a purpose,” he says. “And I think this is probably as good a purpose as any other.”

 

 “This isn’t the first home I’ve had on this street. I used to live in another 18th-century house further down, which I’d spent five years restoring before getting bored, which wasn’t very popular with my partner! We moved out to Greenwich for about six months when an old neighbour contacted me to say that this house had come on the market and that I needed to buy it. I came to look at it the same day. It didn’t present well at all – it had been used as offices. There were photocopiers and water coolers everywhere and horrid olive carpet underfoot – the remnants of a business that was on its last legs. I couldn’t even view all the rooms because they’d lost two keys. But I made an offer straight away. The estate agent couldn’t believe it. He frog-marched me to their offices for fear I might run away before we formalised it.

 

“We moved in in March 2010 and immediately started pulling up the carpets. I was in court every day, then back here at night pulling up flooring in my suit, trying to find out if there were 18th-century boards beneath. It wasn’t entirely successful; there was a lot of plywood! But we did manage to salvage enough boards to redo two full rooms. It took two more years to source enough 18th-century pine boards to match.

 

“All of the panelling in here is original, apart from in the basement, which was originally split into two – a wet kitchen and a dry kitchen. That part of the house had apparently survived intact until about 1989, when a company moved in and ripped it all out. They dug down about three feet, removed all the flagstones, built a breezeblock partition, covered the walls in cement and installed a melamine kitchen, two fire safes, eight loos and six urinals. That was our kitchen for couple of years, as there was too much else to do in the house, but one Christmas Day I’d had enough. I came down with a sledgehammer and set to it, creating what can only be described as a mushroom cloud of dust. I wasn’t particularly popular that Christmas, though I did get the number of loos down to one.

 

“Most people, when they buy a building, are interested in paint colours, or where they’ll put their furniture. It wasn’t like that here. This house was a Gordian knot on epic proportions; we couldn’t broach one issue without tackling three or four others at the same time. We just had to dive in. I know people say you must have a plan, and I suppose if it had been an architect managing the project rather than a lawyer, we would have done. But the reality is that even when you do have a plan, you just can’t legislate for every eventuality. This goes against every bit of advice you’ll ever hear, but I believe that thinking about things too deeply can be paralysing.

 

“There were many unexpected moments in this project, but one particularly stands out. A neighbour told me that they’d noticed a bulge on the front of the house. A structural engineer came and found out that the only thing that was stopping the façade from falling on to the street was a piece of timber lining the shutters. We had to funnel all our resources into stopping that part of the house collapsing. You just can’t prepare for that sort of thing, especially in houses such as these, which truly have a mind of their own. At one point I thought it had something of a malign spirit. It was like it didn’t want to be restored. You’d light a fire in one room and another would start filling up with smoke. You’d fix one leak, repaint the ceiling and a week later one would spring from elsewhere. But after 10 years we’ve got there. I can finally start thinking about paint colours.

 

 “Ever since I was 14 and visited the Royal Crescent in Bath on a school trip, I’ve wanted to recreate an 18th-century space. I’m quite obsessive about detail, but it comes from wanting to be honest. I’ve made sure to use 18th-century locks and drop handles on the doors, for instance, and salvaged Georgian crank hinges on cupboards. It’s important to me that what I do is right. I’m the same when it comes to furniture and paintings, mirrors and lighting. I’m trying to recreate something honestly and genuinely, otherwise it would jar. I’m a great accumulator of stuff and I love that when it all comes together in a particular space you can create something greater than the sum of its parts.

 

“This house is round the corner from Dennis Severs’; he was doing something similar a long time before I was, but the effect is very different. He wanted to create something theatrical, an 18th-century conversation piece. I want what I’m doing to be authentic, not theatrical, but I accept that my idea of what is authentically 18th-century is completely different to someone else’s. Nobody, in truth, really knows what furniture they would have had in these houses – though I admit it probably wasn’t a William Kent console. And so, when I say authentic, what I mean is that I don’t want anything in here that is pretending to be something else. I couldn’t put anything reproduction in here, save for perhaps a missing bit of moulding.

 

“I’m not trying to impart my personality on these rooms. I’m trying to get them back to how they would have been as best I can. It takes time, though – it took us longer to rebuild two chimney stacks than it took for a whole skyscraper to go up behind the house. But it’s worth it, for the feeling you get being here. When I moved into my first house on this street, I moved in with nothing more than a card table and a chamber stick. I’ve never forgotten that evening, walking up the dog-leg staircase through flickering shadows. It was never better than that magical moment. That’s the feeling I’m trying to create.”

Inside 4 Princelet Street, Spitalfields, VÍDEO SEE BELOW / London, 27th January 2010

4 Princelet Street is located in London, England. The property is situated within the historic conservation area of Spitalfields, close to the city of London. The house consists of up to 15 rooms which are available to hire as a location for photography, filming and private functions.

 Nos. 2 and 4 Princelet Street

Formerly Nos. 1 and 2 Princes Street

These two houses, on the south side of the street, were the last of the original houses to be built in Princelet Street. The builder was Samuel Worrall of Spitalfields, carpenter, under ninety-nine-year leases granted by Wood and Michell on 27 January 1723/4, the houses having by then been built. (fn. 64)The site had been vacant in Feb ruary 1721/2. (fn. 65) The leases also included No. 6 Wilkes Street, which was built at the same time. The lease of No. 2 was witnessed by Marmaduke Smith, carpenter.

In June 1724 Worrall assigned his leases of No. 2 and of No. 6 Wilkes Street to a glover for £756. (fn. 66) No. 4 was occupied in 1724 by Benjamin Truman. (fn. 43)

No. 2, the south-west corner house,contains three storeys and a roof loft. The building is one room deep and has a frontage four windows wide, with the doorway in the second opening from the left. Although the original fenestration pattern remains, the front has been refaced, or altered, and covered with stucco, probably around 1860. The ground storey is channel-jointed and the upper part coursed in imitation of stonework. The door way, and the one opening on to Wilkes Street, have cornice-hoods resting on moulded consoles. The interior appears to be largely original. The hall is lined with plain rebated panelling finished with a box-cornice, and the dog-leg staircase has closed strings, turned balusters, column-newels, and moulded straight handrails.

As originally built, No. 2 was uniform with No. 4 which survives in a much less altered state. Each of the upper two storeys of No. 4 has four evenly spaced windows, with a blind window against the party wall to complete the even rhythm across the two fronts. The ground storey has a stucco facing of about 1820, with Doric pilasters supporting a plain entablature. The rest of the front is of yellow brick, with red brick jambs and high segmental arches to the windows, which now contain wooden casements with hoppers. A brick bandcourse underlines the parapet which is finished with a stone coping. One small hipped-roofed dormer lights the loft. The interior finishings are similar to those in No. 2, but in far better order.

http://www.british-history.ac.uk/survey-london/vol27/pp184-189#h3-0002

http://princelet.co.uk/

http://princelet.co.uk/loc1.html

 http://princelet.co.uk/index.html

http://princelet.co.uk/info1.html

Spitalfields' historic association with the silk industry was established by French Protestant (Huguenots) refugees who settled in this area after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685. By settling here, outside the bounds of the City of London, they hoped to avoid the restrictive legislation of the City Guilds. The Huguenots brought with them little, apart from their skills, and an Order in Council of 16 April 1687 raised £200,000 for the relief of their poverty. In December 1687, the first report of the committee set up to administer the funds reported that 13,050 French refugees were settled in London, primarily around Spitalfields, but also in the nearby settlements of Bethnal Green, Shoreditch, Whitechapel and Mile End New Town.

The late 17th and 18th centuries saw an estate of well-appointed terraced houses, built to accommodate the master weavers controlling the silk industry, and grand urban mansions built around the newly created Spital Square. Christ Church, Spitalfields on Fournier Street, designed by the architect Nicholas Hawksmoor, was built during the reign of Queen Anne to demonstrate the power of the established church to the dissenting Huguenots, who had built ten of their own chapels in the area.More humble weavers dwellings were congregated in the Tenterground.

There has been a market on the site since 1638 when Charles I gave a licence for flesh, fowl and roots to be sold in what was then known as Spittle Fields. The Market currently receives around 25,000 visitors every week.

From the 1730s Irish weavers came here, after a decline in the Irish linen industry to take up work in the silk trade. The 18th century saw periodic crises in the silk industry, bought on by imports of French silk – in a lull between the wars between the two rivals; and imports of printed calicos. The depression in the trade, and thence the prices paid to weavers, led to protests. In 1769, the Spitalfield Riots occurred, where attempts were made to break up meetings of weavers, called to discuss the threat to wages, caused by another downturn in the market for silk. This ended with an Irish and a Huguenot weaver being hanged in front of the Salmon and Ball public house at Bethnal Green.

Price controls on amounts master weavers could pay journeymen for each piece were established. This removed all incentive to pay higher wages during good times. During bad times workers had no work. As the price was per piece, there was incentive for using machinery, as master would have to pay for the machine and still pay the same price per piece to journeymen. By 1822 labour rates were so above market labour rates, that much of the employment in silk manufacture had moved to the country. Remaining manufacture tended to focus on expensive fashion items, which required proximity to court and had higher margins.

By the Victorian era, the silk industry had entered a long decline and the old merchant dwellings had degenerated into multi-occupied slums. Spitalfields became a by-word for urban deprivation, and, by 1832, concern at a London cholera epidemic led The Poor Man's Guardian (18 February 1832) to write of Spitalfields:

The low houses are all huddled together in close and dark lanes and alleys, presenting at first sight an appearance of non-habitation, so dilapidated are the doors and windows:- in every room of the houses, whole families, parents, children and aged grandfathers swarm together.

In 1860, a treaty was established with France, allowing the import of cheaper French silks. This left the many weavers in Spitalfields, and neighbouring Bethnal Green and Shoreditch indigent. New trades such as furniture and boot making came to the area; and the large windowed Huguenot houses were found suitable for tailoring, attracting a new population of Jewish refugees drawn to live and work in the textile industry.

By the later 19th century inner Spitalfields had eclipsed rival claimants to the dubious distinction of being the worst criminal rookery of London with common lodging-houses in the Flower and Dean Street area being a focus for the activities of robbers and prostitutes. The latter street was dubbed in 1881 as being "perhaps the foulest and most dangerous street in the metropolis". Another claimant to the distinction of being "the worst street in London" was nearby Dorset Street, which was highlighted by the brutal killing and mutilation of a young woman named Mary Kelly in her lodgings here by the serial killer known as Jack the Ripper in the autumn of 1888.This was the climax of a whole series of slayings of local prostitutes that became known as the Whitechapel Murders. The sanguinary activities of "Jack" was one of the factors which prompted the demolition of some of the worst streets in the area 1891-94. Deprivation, however, continued and was brought to notice by social commentators such as Jack London in his The People of the Abyss (1903). He highlighted 'Itchy Park', next to Christ Church, Spitalfields, as a notorious rendezvous for homeless vagrants.

In the late 20th century the Jewish presence diminished, to be replaced by an influx of Bangladeshi immigrants, who also worked in the local textile industry and made Brick Lane the curry capital of London.

Another development, from the 1960s onwards, has been a campaign to save the housing stock of old merchant terraces to the west of Brick Lane from demolition. Many have been conserved by the Spitalfields Historic Buildings Trust. This has led to gentrification, a large increase in property prices and the removal of the last of the vagrants from the area.

Current 'urban regeneration' has also seen the erection of large modern office blocks, between Bishopsgate and Spitalfields Market. These represent, in effect, an expansion of the City of London, northwards, beyond its traditional bounds, into this area. However, a rear-guard action by conservationists has resulted in the preservation of Old Spitalfields Market and the provision of shopping, leisure amenities and a new plaza behind the city blocks.Permission was granted to demolish the Fruit and Wool exchange on the edge of old Spitalfields market to provide office buildings by developer Exemplar.

Since 1998 the area has formed part of the larger Spitalfields and Banglatown local government ward. This decision was considered controversial at the time and still rouses strong opinions on both sides.

Dennis Severs' House in Folgate Street is a "still-life drama" created by the previous owner as an "historical imagination" of what life would have been like inside for a family of Huguenot silk weavers.[20][21] In 2009, Raven Row, a non-profit contemporary art centre, opened to the public at 56 Artillery Lane. Constructed within a pair of 18th century silk merchants' houses, onto which London practice 6a Architects added two contemporary galleries, it stands on the part of the street know until 1895 as Raven Row. Whitechapel Art Gallery is located at the bottom of Brick Lane.

Amongst the many well known artists living in Spitalfields are Gilbert and George, Ricardo Cinalli, Tracey Emin and Stuart Brisley. TV presenter, architecture expert and Georgian fanatic Dan Cruickshank was an active campaigner for Spitalfields, and continues to live in the area. Writer Jeanette Winterson turned a derelict Georgian house into an organic food shop, Verde's, as part of the Slow Food movement.

Spitalfields figures in a number of works of literature, including A New Wonder, a Woman Never Vexed (performed 1610-14; printed 1632) by William Rowley, a dramatisation of the foundation of St Mary Spital; The People of the Abyss (1903), the journalistic memoir by Jack London; Hawksmoor (1985) by Peter Ackroyd; Rodinsky's Room (1999) by Iain Sinclair and Rachel Lichtenstein; Brick Lane (2003) by Monica Ali; and The Quincunx (1991) by Charles Palliser.

19th century Spitalfields was recreated as the setting for the film From Hell about Jack the Ripper. This included a reconstruction (in Prague) of the notorious Ten Bells pub (still extant on Commercial Street): alleged to have been a rendezvous of some of the Ripper's prostitute victims, before they were murdered. In the film Johnny Depp (as Inspector Abberline) is seen drinking there with Ripper victim Mary Jane Kelly.

‘They all knew’: Michelle Mone hits out at Rishi Sunak over PPE deals

 

‘They all knew’: Michelle Mone hits out at Rishi Sunak over PPE deals

 

Former Tory peer says government was aware of her involvement in PPE Medpro ‘from the very beginning’

 

@peterwalker99

Mon 18 Dec 2023 15.06 GMT

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/dec/18/michelle-mone-hits-out-rishi-sunak-ppe-deals

 

Michelle Mone has condemned Rishi Sunak after he expressed concern at her admission she lied about involvement in a company that won lucrative deals during Covid, saying the government “knew about my involvement from the very beginning”.

 

After the former Conservative peer admitted in a BBC interview on Sunday that she had been untruthful in denying a connection to PPE Medpro, which made millions of pounds in profits over a contract to provide personal protective equipment, Sunak said No 10 was taking the case “incredibly seriously”.

 

In a furious response to the prime minister’s comments, Mone tweeted: “What is Rishi Sunak talking about? I was honest with the Cabinet Office, the government and the NHS in my dealings with them. They all knew about my involvement from the very beginning.”

 

Her comments place even greater pressure on ministers to explain what they knew about the affair, particularly Michael Gove, the levelling up secretary. The Labour leader, Keir Starmer, has already called for Gove to make a statement on Mone and PPE Medpro,

 

In the interview on Sunday, Mone said she had not told the truth about her involvement in the firm to protect her family from media attention. When it was put to her that she had admitted lying to the press, Mone replied: “That’s not a crime.”

 

Asked during a trip to Scotland about Mone’s admission, Sunak said: “The government takes these things incredibly seriously, which is why we’re pursuing legal action against the company concerned in these matters. That’s how seriously I take it and the government takes it.

 

“But it is also subject to an ongoing criminal investigation, and because of that, there’s not much further that I can add.”

 

Mone was made a Conservative peer by David Cameron in 2015, but has been on a leave of absence from the Lords since last year and is no longer in the party.

 

Speaking earlier on Monday, Lord Callanan, the energy efficiency minister, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that he hoped Mone would not return to the upper house.

 

Asked whether as a self-confessed liar she should come back, Callanan said: “I would hope that she would see sense.” Pressed on what he meant, he added: “I would hope that she would not be coming back to the House of Lords.”

 

Guardian investigations found Mone and her husband, Doug Barrowman, were involved with PPE Medpro, which was awarded contracts worth £203m in May and June 2020 after she approached ministers, including Gove, with an offer to supply PPE equipment.

 

Asked about the case during a visit to Leeds, Starmer called it “a shocking disgrace from top to bottom”, adding: “There are now serious questions that I think Michael Gove, the government, needs to answer. Who made the original contact? What was the nature of that discussion that led to the situation that we now learn developed?

 

“I think they should make a statement in the House of Commons today about this so that the public can hear first-hand what actually happened here.”

 

The Labour leader added: “I don’t think she should be in the Lords. I think the government should be held to account for this.”

 

Speaking to BBC One’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg, Mone admitted that she and Barrowman, through their lawyers, repeatedly falsely denied they had any connection to PPE Medpro.

 

She said she regretted having done so: “We’ve done a lot of good but if we were to say anything that we have done that we are sorry for, and that’s … we should have told the press straight up, straight away, nothing to hide … I was just protecting my family. And again, I’m sorry for that, but I wasn’t trying to pull the wool over anyone’s eyes. No one.”

Michelle Mone should be barred from the Lords after PPE scandal, minister says

 

Michelle Mone should be barred from the Lords after PPE scandal, minister says

 

Labour has called on Michael Gove to answer questions over his own role in the awarding of a £200m contract to PPE Medpro

 

Archie Mitchell

1 hour ago

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/michelle-mone-ppe-contracts-scandal-tory-b2465811.html

 

Michelle Mone should be barred from the House of Lords after she admitted standing to benefit from £60million in profit over a PPE contract signed at the height of the Covid crisis, a Tory minister has said.

 

The Tory peer said on Sunday she was “sorry” for denying her links to PPE Medpro, which was awarded government contracts worth more than £200 million to supply personal protective equipment after she recommended it to ministers.

 

But a defiant Baroness Mone said: “I don’t honestly see there is a case to answer. I can’t see what we have done wrong.”

 

On Monday, energy efficiency minister Lord Callanan said she should not return to the House of Lords, saying “she has to speak for herself” and he “would hope that she would see sense”.

 

“I would hope that she would not be coming back to the House of Lords,” Lord Callanan added.

 

Baroness Mone has been on a leave of absence from the Lords for more than a year as she bids to “clear her name” over the scandal.

 

But the disastrous interview, with the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme, saw her facing renewed criticism over the PPE scandal.

 

Lord Callanan told Sky News: “I watched the interview yesterday – I think she should have declared her involvement in that in the House of Lords register, and there is guidance available for that.”

 

Baroness Mone claimed her life had been “destroyed” by allegations about their PPE profits, even though “we’ve only done one thing, which was lie to the press to say we weren’t involved”.

 

Rishi Sunak said he takes the scandal surrounding Baroness Mone “incredibly seriously” but refused to comment further.

 

Asked about her admission she had lied about her involvement in the firm PPE Medpro, the prime minister told reporters during a trip to Scotland: “The Government takes these things incredibly seriously, which is why we’re pursuing legal action against the company concerned in these matters.

 

“That’s how seriously I take it and the Government takes it.

 

“But it is also subject to an ongoing criminal investigation. And because of that, there’s not much further that I can add.”

 

And Labour is also piling pressure on the government over the scandal, after Baroness Mone named Michael Gove as the minister she spoke to in the interview.

 

Referring to Mr Gove, then chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, she said: “I just said, ‘We can help, and we want to help.’ And he was like, ‘Oh my goodness, this is amazing’.”

 

Shadow Cabinet Office minister Nick Thomas-Symonds has called on Mr Gove to answer questions following her claim.

 

In a letter to Mr Gove, he said: “This series of events has led to civil litigation and a National Crime Agency investigation. Yet these ongoing matters should not preclude you from addressing questions about your own involvement and the role of the Government.

 

“Events so far expose a shocking recklessness by the Conservative government with regard to public money, and a sorry tale of incompetence in relation to the so-called ‘VIP Lane’ for procurement during the pandemic.”

 

Baroness Mone, the Ultimo bra tycoon made a peer by Lord Cameron in 2015, has been at the centre of controversy over so-called “VIP lane” contracts.

 

She has repeatedly denied that she had profited from the deal, which she first discussed with government ministers including Mr Gove.

 

Baroness Mone and her husband Doug Barrowman on Sunday admitted that a 30 per cent profit had been made on the contract, around £60 million.

 

But she denied she had bought a yacht with the money and insisted the cash was her husband’s money.

 

“It’s not my yacht, It’s not my money,” she said. “That cash is my husband’s cash, it’s just like my dad going home with his wage packet on a Friday night and giving it to my mum. So she’s benefiting from that as well, but that cash is not my cash and is not my children’s cash. If one day, God forbid, my husband passes away before me then I am a beneficiary as well as his children and my children.”

 

The astonishing interview came days after Baroness Mone appeared to fight back tears in a film about the case – funded by the company at the centre of the scandal. Two leading experts who appeared in the film have since come forward to say they would not have taken part had they been told its focus or funding.

Pandemic PPE profits: Baroness Mone "can't see what we've done wrong"

Michelle Mone tried and failed to ‘generate some sympathy’ in her apology