Montpelier, Brighton

Developed together with the adjacent Clifton Hill area in the mid-19th century, it forms a high-class, architecturally cohesive residential district with "an exceptionally complete character".

Development was initially stimulated when one of the main roads out of Brighton was turnpiked in the late 18th century, but the hilly land—condemned as "hideous masses of unfledged earth" by John Constable,[2] who painted it nevertheless—was mostly devoted to agriculture until the 1820s.

The ascent of Brighton from provincial fishing town to fashionable resort prompted a building boom in the next quarter-century, and Montpelier and Clifton Hill were transformed into districts of architecturally homogeneous streets with carefully designed, intricately detailed housing.

[26] The gender balance is significantly different from that of the city as a whole: while 48.38% of Brighton and Hove's residents were male (as recorded by the 2001 Census), the proportion rose to 54.49% of people in Regency ward.

The downland pasture sloped down to the English Channel coast and was farmed in one of two ways: some parts were divided into strips according to a local system of "laines", furlongs" and "paul-pieces", and other areas were left for the grazing of sheep.

[37] At the time there were only three people living on the farmland of "Church Hill – West Side", including an eccentric former marine corporal who occupied a cave in a former chalk pit.

[40] He may have chosen the secluded site because it was close to the chalybeate spring at St Ann's Well in the neighbouring parish of Hove, popularised by Dr Richard Russell in the 1750s but known to generations of shepherds before that for the health-giving effect it had on their sheep.

[43] The land of Church Hill was ideal for development—land ownership was not complex, unlike in many of the laines, and the sheltered southwest-facing slopes were close to both St Ann's Well and the centre of Brighton's fashionable social scene around Old Steine.

[51] Around the same time, Amon Henry Wilds and Charles Busby built several houses on a former track which became Clifton Road, and work started at Montpelier Terrace with the construction of a pair of villas in 1823.

[1] (Brighton as a whole grew rapidly in the 1840s—between 1841 and 1851, 2,806 new houses were built compared to 437[17] for the preceding decade—but the effect was greater in Montpelier because the station was close by at the foot of West Hill.

[68] Montpelier's residential development was nearly complete by the 1870s, as suggested by an Ordnance Survey map of that time which shows undeveloped fields only in the area beyond Vernon Terrace.

[67] Additions to the Brighton & Hove High School, which had taken over The Temple,[32] included a "drab" set of classrooms in the 1960s, a later administration block and a glazed sports hall in 2001–02 (the last two were designed by architects Morgan Carn Partnership).

[72] St Mary Magdalen's Church, another brick and stone Gothic Revival building, was designed for the area's Roman Catholics in 1861–64 by Gilbert Blount.

[89][90][91] Externally and internally—where the main aisle led the eye to the central altar, and the lectern and pulpit stood to one side—there was little to distinguish it from an Anglican church,[91] and it was known as the "Methodist Cathedral of the South".

[92] Demographic changes meant the congregation dwindled, and the church closed in 1964[93] and was demolished the following year to be replaced by Braemar House, a large block of flats with a "bland red-brick façade".

[55] Extensions included a colonnade of balconies (later enclosed) by the Clayton & Black firm in 1906 and a Vernacular-style recessed wing of two storeys in 1927–28, partly tile-hung and with timber decoration to the gables.

[100] Montpelier residents were unsuccessful in their attempt to get the former hospital listed by English Heritage, who stated that Lainson's original design had been altered so much that much of its character had been lost.

[98][101] Taylor Wimpey, a housebuilding company, bought the hospital in December 2006, but their proposals to clear the site and build a combined residential development and GP surgery were refused twice by the city council, in 2007 and 2008.

[98] In 2009 Taylor Wimpey appealed against the latest refusal to grant planning permission for 149 flats and a four-day public inquiry was held at Brighton Town Hall in May 2009.

The planning inspector, John Papworth, turned down Taylor Wimpey's appeal, praising the architectural quality of Thomas Lainson's main building.

The Wilds, along with Charles Busby, were the three architects most closely associated with the development of Brighton and Hove in the Regency era and the exuberant, confident and strongly planned architecture which still characterises the city.

[31] The west and south façades also had these, but the building was drastically altered in 1911–12: the domed roof was replaced by a mansard, a curious central spiral staircase housed in a cylindrical structure was removed, and chimneys were taken away.

[31] Junior pupils shared the building with the senior school until 1904, after which they moved several times: to Norfolk Terrace, Montpelier Crescent, the former vicarage (in 1922)[57] and finally to new facilities in Hove.

[31] George Cheesman & Son designed it on behalf of Vicar of Brighton Henry Michell Wagner in 1834–35; it is a stuccoed building with prominent gables and windows with mullions and transoms.

[51] The houses combine the Regency-style "gaiety and exuberance" with the "charm and vigour" of Victorian architecture,[112] and the use of angled bay windows set below tented canopies is a late example of this distinctive local practice.

[56][113] The houses are arranged as linked villas, alternating between triplets and pairs: this layout is unique,[56] and the placement of the crescent to face inland towards the South Downs rather than the sea is also unusual.

[37][116] They are in the Italianate style with influences of Regency architecture, and have two bow windows with bonnet-style canopies above, stuccoed walls with extensive rustication, prominently bracketed eaves and cast iron balconies.

[9][117] Various smaller-scale houses, some of which are listed, line Norfolk Road, which developed between the 1830s and the 1860s;[35] canted bay windows and cast iron balconies are characteristic features.

Their individual detailing is slightly different, but pilastered doorcases, architraves, first-floor cast iron balconies and small pediments above the windows are common themes.

Local conservationists set up a limited company, which bought the building in 2006, intending to turn it into a community centre and museum; but it was repossessed in 2008 and was thereafter used for storage by a clothes shop.