Historic homes with ceilings from the Titantic, a food lift from the pub to the bedside and it's £20m cheaper than the Mayfair equivalent
A hundred years ago, those same star-struck fans would have headed to the Adelphi on the Strand, a restaurant next to a theatre of the same name.
Regulars at the fine-dining establishment included some of the most famous names in the history of the English stage: Ellen Terry, Sarah Bernhardt, Mrs Patrick Campbell and Oscar Wilde himself.
While the Adelphi Theatre is still going strong, the former restaurant, at 409-10 Strand, is just a memory. A branch of Byron, the upmarket hamburger chain, opened on the ground floor last year, but the upper floors have been a building site – until the launch of Gatti House, a boutique residential development, this summer.
The living area in one of the four Gatti homes.
The brainchild of Enstar Capital – which has a £115 million real estate portfolio in the West End, Camden and Notting Hill – the complex comprises four bespoke luxury apartments, priced at between £2.95 million and £5.5 million and around £20 million cheaper than the Mayfair equivalent according to the developers. Pride of place goes to the penthouse, which comes with views of the Thames.
Five years in the planning, Gatti House is an impressive development on an eye-catching site. Externally, the white stucco façade of the Grade II listed building, complete with Corinthian columns, casement windows and ornamental balconies, has been meticulously restored. Internally, the past meets the present, with the ornate high-ceilinged rooms fitted out with state-of-the-art modern features such as underfloor heating and advanced home entertainment systems. Luxurious fittings in marble, stone and wood come as standard.
The kitchen in flat number one.
Why Gatti House? Well, gatti is Italian for “cats”, and there are some cat heads cunningly woven into the décor of the apartments. Cats is also, of course, the name of an Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, almost as venerable a feature of the West End as the Adelphi itself. But the explanation is more straightforward.
The name is a tribute to the Gatti family, a Swiss-Italian dynasty who owned a substantial portfolio of theatres and restaurants in the West End. In their heyday, in the late 19th and early 20th century, they were big players.
Ceilings which inspired those in the first class lounge on the Titanic.
Carlo Gatti arrived in London in 1847 and made a big success of selling a novelty food item – ice cream. His brother Giuseppe and Giovanni opened restaurants, music halls and theatres. Giovanni’s sons Agostino and Stefano carried on the good work.
In 1880, the family had its biggest coup yet, purchasing the Adelphi Theatre and, seven years later, opening the restaurant that was to become so celebrated.
Well into the 20th century, the name of Gatti cropped up everywhere. Gaspare Gatti ran a restaurant on the Titanic – the menu was modelled on the one at the Adelphi – and perished with the ship. Sir John Gatti was a prominent Tory politician in the Twenties, as well as a leading theatre manager.
It's the little things that count - like the drinks trolley.
“The Gattis are so inextricably linked to the history of the Adelphi that the name chose itself,” says Simon Lyons, joint chief executive of Enstar Capital. “They were an extraordinary family and our paths have crossed before. We recently bought Marine Ices in Camden, which was also part of the Gatti empire.”
Lyons says he has got more pleasure from Gatti House than from any other project he has been involved in. Enstar had previously specialised in commercial rather than residential developments.
“To be honest, I don’t have the patience to have six meetings talking about door handles,” Lyons admits. But the opportunity to develop such an iconic site was irresistible.
“When we bought the property, there was an amusement arcade on the ground floor and a Chinese language school on the floors above. But with the old architectural features still intact, it had huge potential. Simply as a renovation project, it could hardly fail.”
A Gatti House bathroom.
If the site was an ugly duckling, the same was true of the location. When the original Adelphi Theatre Restaurant was built, in 1887, the Strand was one of the most fashionable streets in the West End. The Savoy Hotel, on the other side of the street, dates from 1889, and early guests included Monet, who stayed there when he was painting his famous views of the Thames.
But between the wars, the Strand slipped down the London pecking order.
When the British version of Monopoly was launched in the Thirties, the Strand only merited a red square, along with Fleet Street. It was seen as a notch below Leicester Square, a couple of notches below Bond Street and Regent Street and in a completely different financial league to Mayfair and Park Lane.
The original plaster work that was uncovered beneath the grimy walls of the pool hall.
There was something shabby about the whole area. Tourists coming into Charing Cross and turning right up the Strand were under no illusions that they were visiting a fashionable part of the capital. The Coutts private bank, and Simpson’s on the Strand, faded into a backdrop of drab eateries and nondescript office buildings.
Only with the redevelopment of Covent Garden in the past 20 years has the Strand started to come back into its own. And the developers have got the message.
Galliard Homes set the ball rolling, transforming Marconi House at 336-7 Strand – the building from which George VI delivered his famous “King’s Speech” in 1939 – into 86 luxury apartments. St Edward Homes, part of the Berkeley Group, has developed 203 luxury apartments at 190 Strand, while Seastar Developments has a £20 million development in the pipeline at 226-8 Strand.
The living area in one of the flats designed to remind buyers of the New York meatpacking district.
Slowly but surely the whole southern half of theatreland has been getting a major facelift. It is becoming an area not just to go to shows and eat in, but to live.
Enstar Capital has certainly recognised the potential lurking here. One of its earlier purchases in the area was the famous Nell Gwynne Tavern in Bull Inn Court which has a pizza lift into the bedrooms at Gatti House. Just in case the residents get peckish.
Gatti House can only bring added lustre, reviving memories of the Adelphi in its great days, when the theatre rang with laughter and, next door, the tables were being set for a memorable meal in scintillating company.
The apartments are on the market with Beauchamp Estates (beauchamp.co.uk) and CBRE (cbreresidiential.com).
And, the library. Surely home to an Oscar Wilde book or two.
Source:- http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/property/11793470/Londons-newest-super-flats-with-a-pizza-lift-from-pub-to-bedroom.html
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