{{Short description|Garden square in London, England}} {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}} {{Use British English|date=March 2025}} thumb|Hereford Square, north side thumb|Hereford Square (centre) on an 1860s Ordnance Survey map not long after it was built and before the area was fully developed
'''Hereford Square''' is a garden square in South Kensington, London SW7. It lies to the west of Gloucester Road, which forms the east side of the square. Wetherby Place is the western continuation, running off the north-west corner of the square.
10–23 and 27–35 Hereford Square have been listed Grade II on the National Heritage List for England since November 1984.<ref name=NHLE1023>{{NHLE|num=1191180|desc=10–23, Hereford Square|access-date=17 January 2020|mode=cs2}}</ref><ref name=NHLE2735>{{NHLE|num=1358180|desc=27–35, Hereford Square|access-date=17 January 2020|mode=cs2}}</ref>
The private communal gardens in the centre of Hereford Square are {{convert|0.3692|ha|acre|abbr=off}} in size.<ref name='LGO'>{{cite web|title=London Gardens Online – Hereford Square|url=https://londongardenstrust.org/conservation/inventory/site-record/?ID=KAC074|publisher=London Parks & Gardens Trust|access-date=18 January 2020}}</ref>
The garden was used as a baseball field during World War II by American soldiers.<ref name='LGO'/>
==History== Hereford Square was built by the architect Thomas Holmes from 1845 to 1850.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://HISDESINS WERE ALTERED AND Many site have had extra floors added to them after ww2 bombing//www.opensquares.org/detail/Hereford.html|title=Hereford Square SW7|website=www.opensquares.org|accessdate=11 December 2017}}</ref>
The directly bomb struck houses from World War II have been rebuilt to imitate their original style recently after being yellow brick buildings for over 50 years.<ref>{{cite web |title=24-26 Hereford Square, Kensington, London – the Twentieth Century Society |url=https://c20society.org.uk/lost-modern/24-26-hereford-square-kensington-london}}</ref> However, 1-5 are still concrete boxes. The houses all follow a relatively similar design with landings, many floors and an underground storage shed also used as a plant room or server room as well as a patio at the back.<ref>{{cite web |title=Moveli - Hereford Square, London, SW7 |url=https://www.moveli.co.uk/property/580358}}</ref>
==Notable buildings and residents== *George Crichton Wells (1914–1999), dermatologist<ref>{{cite web|url=http://munksroll.rcplondon.ac.uk/Biography/Details/5043|title=Munks Roll Details for George Crichton Wells|website=munksroll.rcplondon.ac.uk|accessdate=11 December 2017}}</ref> *George Borrow (1803–1881), lived at No. 22. *Frederick William Hulme (1816–1884), landscape painter and illustrator, lived at No. 4, according to the 1851 census.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=50316|title=Hereford Square area: The Day estate – British History Online|website=www.british-history.ac.uk|accessdate=11 December 2017}}</ref> *John Arrowsmith, cartographer, lived at No. 35 from 1861 to 1873.<ref name=Arrowsmith>{{cite ODNB|url=https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-701|title=Arrowsmith, John (1790–1873)|last=Baigent|first=Elizabeth|year=2004 |doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/701 |isbn=978-0-19-861412-8 |accessdate=17 January 2020}}</ref> *Robert Nandor Berki, political scientist, lived at No. 7 in the late 1950s.<ref name=Berki>{{cite ODNB|url=https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-3561|title=Berki, Robert Nandor (1936–1991)|last=Parekh|first=Bhikhu|year=2004 |doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/3561 |isbn=978-0-19-861412-8 |accessdate=17 January 2020}}</ref> *William Henry Brookfield, clergyman, died at No. 16 in 1874.<ref name=Brookfield>{{cite ODNB|url=https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-3561|title=Brookfield, William Henry (1809–1874)|last=Matthew|first=H.C.G.|year=2004 |doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/3561 |isbn=978-0-19-861412-8 |accessdate=17 January 2020}}</ref> *H. O. Arnold-Forster, writer and politician, died at No. 27 in 1909.<ref name=Forster>{{cite ODNB|url=https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-30459|title=Forster, Hugh Oakeley Arnold- (1855–1909)|last=Shannon|first=R. T.|doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/30459 |isbn=978-0-19-861412-8 |accessdate=17 January 2020}}</ref>
The artist Walter Sickert and his wife Ellen stayed at No. 10 Hereford Square in the autumn of 1890 with Ellen's sister, Jane Cobden.<ref name="BaronSickert2006">{{cite book|author1=Wendy Baron|author2=Walter Sickert|title=Sickert: Paintings and Drawings|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4S5K_DSH4hgC|year=2006|publisher=Yale University Press|isbn=0-300-11129-0|page=135}}</ref> The model and writer Tara Moss recalled living in a "freezing granny flat" of a mansion in Hereford Square while she worked as a babysitter during the early days of her modelling career in her 2014 memoir ''The Fictional Woman''.<ref name="Moss2014">{{cite book|author=Tara Moss|title=The Fictional Woman|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=STPIAgAAQBAJ|date=1 June 2014|publisher=HarperCollins|isbn=978-1-4607-0058-7|page=11}}</ref>
The writer and social activist Frances Power Cobbe lived with her partner, the sculptor Mary Lloyd, at No. 26 from 1862 to 1884.<ref name='LGBTHistory'>{{cite web|title=LGBT History Month|url=https://lgbthistorymonth.org.uk/latest-news/page/149/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200118213135/https://lgbthistorymonth.org.uk/latest-news/page/149/|url-status=dead|archive-date=18 January 2020|publisher=LGBT History Month|accessdate=18 January 2020}}</ref>
==Fictional references== The central character in Iris Murdoch's ''A Severed Head'' lives in Hereford Square.
==References== {{Reflist}}
== External links == {{commons category-inline|Hereford Square}}
{{Coord|51|29|32.61|N|0|10|53.42|W|scale:1563_region:GB|display=title}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hereford Square}} Category:1845 establishments in England Category:Communal gardens Category:Grade II listed buildings in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea Category:Grade II listed houses in London Category:Houses completed in the 19th century Hereford Square Category:Streets in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea
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