Cheyne Walk is a historic road in Chelsea, London, England, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. It runs parallel with the River Thames. Before the construction of Chelsea Embankment reduced the width of the Thames here, it fronted the river along its whole length.
Location
At its western end, Cheyne Walk meets Cremorne Road end-on at the junction with Lots Road. The Walk runs alongside the River Thames until Battersea Bridge where, for a short distance, it is replaced by Chelsea Embankment with part of its former alignment being occupied by Ropers Gardens. East of Old Church Street and Chelsea Old Church, the Walk runs along the north side of Albert Bridge Gardens and Chelsea Embankment Gardens parallel with Chelsea Embankment. At the north end of Albert Bridge, the Walk merges with Chelsea Embankment. The Walk ends at Royal Hospital Road.
At the western end between Lots Road and Battersea Bridge is a collection of residential houseboats that have been in situ since the 1930s. At the eastern end is the Chelsea Physic Garden with its cedars. It marks the boundary of the, now withdrawn, extended London Congestion Charge Zone. The section west of Battersea Bridge forms part of the A3220 road.
History
Cheyne Walk takes its name from William Cheyne, Viscount Newhaven who owned the manor of Chelsea until 1712. Most of the houses were built in the early 18th century. Before the construction in the 19th century of the busy Chelsea Embankment, which now runs in front of it, the houses fronted the River Thames. The most prominent building is Carlyle Mansions.
Prior to the 18th century construction, Cheyne Walk was the site of Chelsea Manor, built by Henry VIII in the 1530s. Chelsea Old Church dates from 1157 and Crosby Hall is a reconstructed medieval merchant's house relocated from the City of London in 1910.
In 1951, the Metropolitan Borough of Chelsea planned to construct a new river wall straightening the river bank west of Battersea Bridge. On the reclaimed land behind the wall a new arterial road and public gardens were to be constructed. Cheyne Walk was to remain unchanged to the north of the new public gardens. The works would have reduced the foreshore and required the removal of the house boat berths. The works did not take place. In the 1960s, plans for the Greater London Council's London Motorway Box project would have seen the West Cross Route, a motorway standard elevated road, constructed from Battersea to Harlesden through Earl's Court. A spur road would have been constructed from the motorway to the junction of Cheyne Walk and Lots Road. The plans were abandoned because of the cost and opposition from local communities.
Brunel House at 105-106 Cheyne Walk was designed by Frederick MacManus and Partners Architects in the 1950s and was awarded the RIBA London Architecture Bronze Medal for 1957.
In 1972, number 96 Cheyne Walk, the then home of Philip Woodfield, a British civil servant, was the site of a top secret meeting between the British government and the leadership of the Provisional IRA aimed at ending the violence in Northern Ireland. The talks were inconclusive and the violence soon started again.
Notable residents
Many famous people have lived (and continue to live) in the Walk:
No. 1:
Samuel Prout Newcombe (b. 1824) entrepreneur, leased the property from the ground landlord, the Earl Cadogan, in 1891 shortly after it had been rebuilt. Newcombe had made his money in the 1850s from 'The London School of Photography', a photographic portrait studio that soon had branches across London and beyond, exploiting the public's appetite for carte de visite portraits. His daughter Bertha Newcombe (1857–1947), who lived in the house until her father's death in 1912, was an artist, illustrator and suffragist. She had a relationship with George Bernard Shaw, who sat for a portrait in her studio within the house.
No.2:
John Barrymore American actor, lived for a short time at No.2, on the corner with Flood Street.
Vera Brittain, novelist and pacifist, and her husband, George Catlin, lived at number 2 before and during the Second World War.
No.3:
Admiral William Henry Smyth, and later Keith Richards, lived at number 3, which in 1945 became a National Trust property housing the Benton Fletcher collection of keyboard instruments.
No.4:
George Eliot spent the last three weeks of her life at number 4.
William Sandys Wright Vaux, antiquarian.
William Dyce, Scottish painter and arts tutor.
Daniel Maclise, painter.
Michael Bloomberg, the former mayor of New York City, acquired number 4 in 2015.
No.5:
The miser John Camden Neild lived at number 5.
Howard Frank, English estate agent and co-founder of the Knight Frank estate agent chain.
No.6:
Sir Arthur Sullivan, English composer, attended boarding school at number 6 in 1854.
Edward Dundas Butler, translator and senior librarian at the Department of Printed Books, British Museum.
Archibald Sinclair, 1st Viscount Thurso, British Liberal politician, Secretary of State for War during World War II.
Gerald Scarfe now lives there.
The house has a plaque to commemorate Margaret Damer Dawson, who was an early head of the women's police service.
No.10:
David Lloyd George lived at number 10.
No.11:
Sir George Scott Robertson, Colonial Administrator and traveller in Afghanistan, lived at number 11, as did Sir Colin Scott-Moncrieff, British civil engineer, most notably in colonial Egypt.
No. 12:
Sir John Scott Lillie, JP, decorated Peninsular War veteran, Deputy Lieutenant of Middlesex, inventor and political activist lived at no. 12 (previously, no. 13) Cheyne Walk and added a floor to it. The building was demolished in 1887, but elements from it were later used in the reconstruction of 1 Cheyne Walk.
No.13:
Ralph Vaughan Williams lived at number 13 from 1905 to 1928. There, he wrote works including his first three symphonies, the Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis, The Lark Ascending, and Hugh the Drover.
No.14:
Bertrand Russell lived at number 14 in 1902.
No.15:
The landscape painter Cecil Gordon Lawson lived at number 15 (a number of his works still hang there).
The engraver Henry Thomas Ryall lived at number 15.
18th-century Admiral Sir John Balchen lived at number 15.
The Allason family, well known for their political and literary influence, lived at number 15.
The Baron and Baroness Courtney of Penwith lived at number 15.
Hester Dowden, English spiritualist, lived at number 15.
No.16:
Dante Gabriel Rossetti lived at number 16 (where he was banned from keeping peacocks due to the noise) from 1862 to 1882.
Hall Caine, novelist, as Rossetti's housemate.
Frederick Sandys, painter, as Rossetti's housemate 1866–67.
Algernon Charles Swinburne.
Florence Kate Upton, English illustrator, creator of the Golliwog character.
John Paul Getty II lived here from the late 1970s to the early 1990s.
Jacques Blumenthal, German pianist and composer.
No.17: