Plaque (lost): Lyons first teashop
Erection date: 20/9/1894
First Lyons teashop opened 20 September 1894.
Site: Lyons first teashop (1 memorial)
W1, Piccadilly, 213
We thank History of Kilburn and West Hampstead for the photo. They published it in connection with their biography of Edwin Levy who owned the building and was a good friend of Joseph Lyons and Isidore Gluckstein. We first saw photographs of this shop in the excellent book giving the history of the family that built the Lyons empire, Legacy by Thomas Harding published by Heinemann.
That book has two photos of the shop. The first, presumably taken when it first opened as a teashop, after extensive remodelling, shows it with an ornate fascia and pilastered entrance. The Kilburn and West Hampstead photo was probably taken to record the re-remodelled shop with its streamlined design and 1930's chrome. Also we note that the entrance has been shifted left of centre. The second photo in the book shows the shopfront in 1953, plaque still in place, unchanged, except for the coronation decorations.
Jamie Barras has a 2009 photo of the whole Victorian building captioned "A P Howell, completed 1863". Since then it has been demolished and replaced with St James’s Gateway, which, despite its late date, seems to us to have post-modern tendencies, such as the feature cornice. The Evening Standard reported on the campaign to save the 8 landmark buildings that were lost to this development.
