Waldegrave Road 11
Road: Waldegrave Road
Property: 11
Pizza Express, formerly the Horse and Groom Public House.
The road connecting Teddington with Strawberry Hill in the eighteenth century was known as Fry's Lane and in the early nineteenth century, Factory Lane, following the establishment by Alexander Barclay of a wax manufacturing factory there in 1800; finally, the name was changed again to Waldegrave Road, after Frances Lady Waldegrave (1821-1879) widow of the 7th Earl Waldegrave, and long term resident of Strawberrry Hill House.
Following the enclosure of the common fields in this area around 1800, a large pond covered the south west part of the road where it reached the centre of Teddington. This area was substantially affected by the coming of the railways to Teddington in 1863, with the new railway track being built right through the site of the pond. A road bridge was also constructed to reunite the two parts of Teddington that had been separated by the railway. Several properties were built on the bridge approach, known as Bridge Place, and let to commercial tenants, such as a butcher, a china dealer and a grocer. No. 6 Bridge Place was a large detached house and shop with plate glass front occupied by William Dunkley, an ironmonger, at the rent of £60 per annum. The property was extensive consisting of 3 bedrooms and a double drawing room upstairs. On the ground floor was the shop, a parlour, store rooms, kitchen, scullery, larder, coal cellar and WC together with a paved yard covered with a glazed roof.
By the time of the 1871 census, no. 6 was no longer an ironmongers but was the premises of a beer retailer William Grudge. Thereafter the premises were always associated with the sale of beer and the running of a public house. Subsequent beer retailers included the aptly named Frederick Walter Beer, JD Thaxter and William Strugnell. By 1914 the property was known as the Horse and Groom (perhaps because there was a small livery stables at the rear) and the street numbering was changed to no. 11 Waldegrave Road.
In 1925 a planning application was submitted on behalf of Watney Combe and Reid, brewers at Mortlake and the then owner of the public house, to make various alterations. The architects were Petch and Fermaud, a Central London practice which still exists today (2013). The proposed works were to reconfigure the interior and to change the outside of the ground floor including tiling the wall and inserting new windows and doors.
The Horse and Groom continued as a public house until the 1990s but, owing to declining business, it closed in 1996. However there was a new lease of life for the building when the company Pizza Express purchased the property in 2000 and turned it into one of their restaurants. The building looks much the same from the outside as when the 1925 changes were made although there is now only one set of doors into the street, the other door having been replaced by a window.
(This information comes from a booklet called "The Building of a Borough" which was produced by Richmond Council in 2013 in connection with an exhibition of photographs and descriptions of buildings. The photograph of it under the name "Horse and Groom comes from a postcard reproduced in that booklet.)
This page is part of the Directory of Buildings of Townscape Merit (BTMs) and Listed Buildings in Teddington assembled by the Planning and History Groups of The Teddington Society. Click on any photo for a higher resolution version. Copyright for the material on this page rests with the contributor.