The Beaumont Hotel is a
luxury 5 star hotel in fashionable
Mayfair. It offers visitors a choice
of 73 rooms of which 23 are studios and
suites. The hotel's website adds
that, "... The Beaumont is superbly
located on a quiet garden square,
close to the luxury shops, galleries
and museums of Mayfair, St James's and
the West End. Grand in style yet
intimate and welcoming, its design is
inspired by the great Art Deco hotels
of the 1920s."
However, the
Beaumont's history is much different
than you might expect. Far from
being a luxury hotel it staterd life in
the 1920s as multi-storey car park that
was given Grade II listed status in
2009. It was regarded as worthy of
listed status because of its, "...
Special architectural interest: the
façade is remarkably ambitious for a
car park of this date -
Special historic interest: for its
importance in the evolution of the
multi-storey car park as a
distinctive C20 building type
- Group value: with the listed
electricity generating station
opposite in Brown Hart Gardens,
together representing how
utilitarian structures can be
afforded an ambitious architectural
treatment in this prestigious area."
When listed the
building was described as having an, "...
Open-fronted ground floor carried on
two columns with stylised capitals;
over-sized egg-and-dart frieze above.
Above this, the 3 central bays are
separated by broad pilasters into
three 1-window bays divided by
pilasters with stylised capitals. End
bays slightly set-forward, flanked by
plain pilasters; each has projecting
2-storey pavilion: that to N has
paired round-arched entrances; that to
S has single with small window to
eitherside; both have first-floor
window set in round-headed recessed
arch, and paterae ornament to either
side. The forecourt between the
pavilions always accommodated a
filling station..."
It was built for Macy's
and it was, "... one of the first
garages to cater principally for
shoppers, offering free parking to the
customers of nearby Selfridge's
department store." The
side wings of the building apparently
contained facilities for customers and
their chauffeurs. "The
garage changed hands several times,
the longest occupant being Dagenham
Motors Ltd from c1932 to the 1980s."
One of the unique
features of the building in its new guise
as a hotel is the robot like creature that
sits squatting on top of one of the
wings. This is "ROOM" an
architectural sculpture by Anthony Gormley
that, as he points out, were it stand up
would be 22 metres high. Gormley
explains that, "... In both its
title and form, the work treats the
body as habitat: our primary dwelling
place, while still being a resolute
object commanding space. The
house-sized sculpture is made of large
rectangular steel volumes that apply
the syntax of architecture to the
body. Inside ROOM there is no
furniture apart from the bed covered
in white linen. The internal surfaces
of the hollow blocks provide ledges
and niches. The wood is left untreated
with finger joints at the corners left
slightly proud. The walls are made of
wooden planks of different widths of a
dark, reddish-brown colour with the
figuring of the oak modulating the
surface. I want the room to be
both in the city but absolutely
removed from it, giving a feeling of
enclosure within and exposure without.
I want it to be a safe-haven, a
retreat, a place of peace, with a
feeling of being fully enclosed but
not cut off from outside. The window
above the bed is high and gives a view
of the sky and can be opened. At
night, the shutters allow total
blackout."
For visitors to the hotel ROOM is the
bedroom of a luxurious suite.
