Somerset House is a large building complex situated on the south side of the Strand in central London, overlooking the River Thames, just east of Waterloo Bridge.

The present Somerset House was designed by Sir William Chambers, begun in 1776, and was further extended with Victorian era outer wings to the east and west in 1831 and 1856 respectively.

[5]: 9  In 1539, Edward Seymour, 1st Earl of Hertford (died 1552), obtained a grant of land at "Chester Place, outside Temple Bar, London"[6] from his brother-in-law King Henry VIII.

He built a fountain known as Mount Parnassus with a grotto carved with sea-shells and a black marble female figure representing the River Thames.

[13] The refurbished palace was the setting for elaborate entertainments at the wedding of Anne's lady in waiting Jean Drummond on 3 February 1614, including a masque Hymen's Triumph written by Samuel Daniel.

Frances Coke, Viscountess Purbeck was appointed keeper of Denmark House, and Mary Villiers, Countess of Buckingham frequently stayed there.

[17] Between 1630 and 1635 Inigo Jones built a chapel where Henrietta Maria of France, the wife of King Charles I, could exercise her Roman Catholic religion.

They failed to find a buyer, although a sale of the contents (most notably 1,570 paintings owned by Charles I)[19] realised the very considerable sum (for that time) of £118,000.

[5]: 25 Two years later, with the Restoration, Queen Henrietta Maria returned and in 1661 began a considerable programme of rebuilding, the main feature of which was a magnificent new river front, again to the design of the late Inigo Jones, who had died at Somerset House in 1652.

Titus Oates made full use of this prejudice in the fabricated details of the Popish Plot and it was alleged that Sir Edmund Berry Godfrey, whose murder was one of the great mysteries of the age, had been killed in Somerset House before his body had been smuggled out and thrown into a ditch below Primrose Hill.

[5]: 63  After the Glorious Revolution in 1688, Somerset House entered on a long period of decline, being used (after Queen Catherine left England in 1692) for grace and favour residences.

3. c. 33), for the purpose of, inter alia, "erecting and establishing Publick Offices in Somerset House, and for embanking Parts of the River Thames lying within the bounds of the Manor of Savoy".

[22] Somerset House was still technically a royal palace and therefore Crown property, with most work being done by the King's Master Mason, John Deval.

[25] Initially a certain William Robinson, Secretary to the Board of Works, was commissioned to design and build the new Somerset House, but he died in 1775 shortly after being appointed.

[27] Chambers' own influences stemmed from Palladianism, the principles of which were applied throughout Somerset House, inside and outside, both in its large-scale conception and in its small-scale details.

[28] The North Wing, fronting the Strand, was the first part of the complex to be built; its design was based on Inigo Jones's drawings for the riverfront of the former palace.

At the time of construction, the Thames was not embanked and the river lapped the South Wing, where a great arch allowed boats and barges to penetrate to landing places within the building.

[29] It was originally envisaged that the main quadrangle would be flanked by two terraces of houses, one to the east and one to the west, providing accommodation for several of the Commissioners whose offices were based there.

[30] In 1815 Sir Robert Smirke was appointed as Attached Architect to Somerset House; in 1817 he added the Legacy Duty Office to the north-west corner of the quadrangle, its design in keeping with Chambers's adjacent façade.

[29] In addition to applying a rich scheme of architectural decoration, Chambers enhanced the exterior of Somerset House with a multiplicity of sculptures and other visual embellishments.

[29] Inside, most of the offices were plain and business-like, but in the North Wing the formal rooms and public spaces of the learned societies were enriched with painted ceilings (by Cipriani, Benjamin West, Angelica Kauffman, J. F. Rigaud, Charles Catton and Joshua Reynolds), ornamental plasterwork (by Thomas Collins and Thomas Clerk) and casts of classical sculptures.

[33] A key reason for rebuilding Somerset House was to provide accommodation for a diverse variety of learned societies, public offices and naval administrators.

The Society of Antiquaries was also accommodated in the eastern half of the wing, though its premises were limited to a first-floor meeting room, a ground-floor library, an apartment in the attic and a kitchen in the basement.

Under the Inland Revenue, the Laboratory's work expanded to encompass the testing of many different substances, including food, beer and spirits, as well as tobacco.

This office held all birth, marriage and death certificates in England and Wales until 1970, when the Registry and its associated archives were moved to nearby St Catherine's House at Aldwych.

As part of this development, its architect James Pennethorne created a monumental new façade alongside the approach road to Waterloo Bridge (which had not been in existence when Chambers was alive).

Grants from the Heritage Lottery Fund financed the conversion of the South Wing between 1999 and 2003: a visitor centre featuring audio-visual displays on the history of the building, the gilded state barge of the Lord Mayor of the City of London and a shop and café were opened, overlooking the river.

[69] In stages from 2009 to 2013, HM Revenue and Customs withdrew from the other parts of the building; since March 2013 the Somerset House Trust has had oversight of the entire complex.

[43] In the winter the central courtyard is home to a popular open-air ice rink, as seen during the opening credits of the 2003 Christmas-themed film Love Actually.

[5]: 123 Somerset House now has more than a hundred tenants, comprising a large and diverse collection of creative organisations and artists including Dance Umbrella, 7Wonder, Hofesh Shechter Company and the Royal Society of Literature.