Estate Agents Regents Park Guide to the Area

Regents Park estate agents Kubie Gold Associates are pleased to bring this information to you. We hope you find it useful.

Location and History

The park has an outer ring road called the Outer Circle (4.3 km) and an inner ring road called the Inner Circle, which contains the most carefully tended section of the park, Queen Mary's Gardens. Apart from two link roads between these two, the park is reserved for pedestrians. The south, east and most of the west sides of the park are lined with elegant white stucco terraces of houses designed by John Nash. Running through the northern end of the park is Regent's Canal which connects the Grand Union Canal to the former London Docks.

The 487 acre (2 km²) park is mainly open parkland which supports a wide range of facilities and amenities including gardens, a lake with a heronry, waterfowl and a boating area, sports pitches, and children's playgrounds. The north-east end of the park contains London Zoo. There are several public gardens with flowers and specimen plants, including Queen Mary's Gardens in the Inner Circle, in which the Open Air Theatre is located; the formal Italian Gardens and adjacent informal English Gardens in the south east corner of the park; and the gardens of St John's Lodge. Winfield House, the official residence of the U.S. Ambassador to the United Kingdom, stands in private grounds in western section of the park. Nearby is the domed London Central Mosque, better known as Regent's Park mosque, which is a highly visible landmark from parts of the park.

Located on the outside of the southern portion of the Inner Circle is Regent's College, a consortium of institutes of higher education and home of London Business School (LBS), as well as the European Business School London, British American College London (BACL) and Webster Graduate School among others.

The land, which was formerly known as Marylebone Park, had been Crown property for many centuries, and had been leased to the Dukes of Portland as a hunting ground. When the lease expired in 1811 the Prince Regent (later King George IV) commissioned architect John Nash to create a masterplan for the area. Nash originally envisaged a palace for the Prince and a number of grand detached villas for his friends, but when this was put into action from 1818 onwards, the palace and most of the villas were dropped. However, most of the proposed terraces of houses around the fringes of the park were built. Nash did not complete all the detailed designs himself; in some instances, completion was left in the hands of other architects such as the young Decimus Burton. The Regent Park scheme was integrated with other schemes built for the Prince Regent by Nash, including Regent Street and Carlton House Terrace in a grand sweep of town planning stretching from St James's Park to Parliament Hill. The park was first opened to the general public in 1845, initially for two days a week.

Queen Mary's Gardens in the Inner Circle were created in the 1930s, bringing that part of the park into use by the general public for the first time. The site had originally been used as a plant nursery and had later been leased to the Royal Botanic Society. In 1982 an IRA terrorist attack took place in the park; a bomb was detonated at the bandstand, killing seven soldiers (see Hyde Park and Regents Park bombings). The sports pitches, which had been relaid with inadequate drainage after the Second World War, were relaid between 2002 and 2004, and in 2005 a new sports pavilion was constructed.

On 7 July 2006 the Park held an event for people to remember the events of the 7 July 2005 London bombings. Members of the public placed mosaic tiles on to seven purple petals. Later bereaved family members laid yellow tiles in the centre to finish the mosiac.

Borough

This area guide is brought to you by Kubie Gold Associates, local Regents Park Estate Agents.

Local Medical Services

There is a large hospital called St Marys Hospital near Regent's Park: http://www.st-marys.nhs.uk

Kubie Gold Associates, estate agents in Regents Park bring you this information.

Local Schools

A good list of schools and colleges in the Regent's Park area is provided by Yell.com:

http://www.yell.com/Regents-Park-Schools-Colleges/

St Marylebone C of E School is a public specialist secondary school for girls in London. It specialises in Performing Arts and Maths&Computing. In the 6th form. It was founded in 1791. In a recent (2007) secondary school ranking, it came 24th in the whole of England, beating many private schools. Many famous people attended the school. It's one of the most oversubscribed schools in London. The ratio of places and subscriptions is 1:120!

Francis Holland School is the name of two independent day schools for girls in central London governed by the Francis Holland (Church of England) Schools Trust. The schools are located at Clarence Gate (near Baker Street NW1) and at Graham Terrace (near Sloane Square SW1). The schools were founded in the 1870s by Canon Francis James Holland for the education of girls in London. He was born in London on 20th January 1828 and educated at Eton and Trinity College.

The University of Westminster is a university, formed in 1992 as a result of the Further and Higher Education Act, 1992, which allowed the London Polytechnic to rename itself as a university. The London Polytechnic itself was formed from the merger of the Holborn College of Law, Languages and Commerce and the Regent Street Polytechnic in 1971. Its antecedents, the Royal Polytechnic Institution date back to 1838, making it one of the oldest post-school educational institutions in Britain.

London Business School is an international business school and a constituent college of the University of London. It teaches postgraduate degrees in finance and management, including MBA courses, Masters in Finance (also known as MiF, a finance specialist program), as well as non-degree courses for business executives. It is located in central London, beside Regent's Park. It was established in 1965, after the Franks Report recommended the establishment of two high quality schools, as part of existing universities (London and Manchester), but with considerable autonomy.

Library

There is a public library in Regent's Park

http://www.camden.gov.uk/ccm/navigation/leisure/libraries-and-online-learning-centres/regents-park-library/

Local Associations & Societies

Regents Park estate agents Kubie Gold Associates hopes this information is useful to you.

Transport Links

Regent's Park is well served by  these tube stations:

Regent's Park (Bakerloo line), Great Portland Street (Hammersmith & City, Circle & Metropolitan lines), Baker Street (Hammersmith & City, Circle, Jubilee, Metropolitan & Bakerloo lines), St John's Wood (Jubilee line), Camden Town (Northern line), Mornington Crescent (Northern line).

The Regent's Park area is well served by buses. Here is a link to the Transport for London bus map of the area:  www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/gettingaround/maps/buses/pdf/greatportlandstreetandregentspark-2102.pdf 

 This area guide is brought to you by Kubie Gold Associates, local Regent's Park estate agent.

Leisure Facilities

There are many gyms in the vicinity and a handy list is provided here: http://www.city-visitor.com/regentspark/gyms.html 

Regent's Park is a lovely place to go walking, running, and dog-walking. 

The Park was scheduled to play a significant role in the 2012 Summer Olympics, hosting the baseball and softball, but those sports have been dropped from Olympic program with effect from 2012. However the cycling road race will still cut through Regent's Park.

Helpful Web Sites

The offical Regent's Park web site: http://www.royalparks.org.uk/parks/regents_park/

The All In London directory has this page of information centred around Regent's Park tube station: http://www.allinlondon.co.uk/tube-regents-park.php

Places of Interest & Notable Buildings

Nine villas were built in the park. There follows a list of their names as shown on Christopher and John Greenwood's map of London (second edition, 1830), with details of their subsequent fates:

Close to the western and northern edges of the park

Marquis of Hertford's Villa: later known as St Dunstans; rebuilt as Winfield House in the 1930s and now the American Ambassador's residence. 

Grove House: still a private residence but previously owned by Robert Holmes a Court, the Australian businessman. His estate sold the property after he died from a heart attack in the early 1990's. Grove House is said to have one of the largest gardens in central London after Buckingham Palace. The garden runs along the edge of Regent's Canal. 

Hanover Lodge: as of 2005 under restoration for renewed use as a private residence. Recently (2007) the subject of a Court Case (won by Westminster City Council against the architect, Quinlan Terry, and contractor, Walter Terry & Co) that ruled that two Grade II listed buildings had been illegally demolished while the property was leased to Conservative peer, Lord Bagri. While the main residence still exists, the neo-classical roadside lodges no longer stand. 

Albany Cottage: demolished. Site now occupied by London Central Mosque. 

Holford House (not shown on Greenwood's map; but see Stanford's map of 1862): built in 1832 north of Hertford House, and the largest of the villas at that time. From 1856 it was occupied by Regent's Park College (which subsequently moved to Oxford in 1927). In 1944 Holford House was destroyed to a great extent when a bomb was dropped on it during World War II, and it was demolished in 1948.

Around the Inner Circle

St. John's Lodge: still a private residence, but part of its garden is now a public garden. This is an arrangement with the Lodge's owners who have allowed the main portion of their garden to be enjoyed by the public. 

The Holme: still a private residence. The garden is open several days a year via the National Gardens Scheme. 

South Villa: Site of George Bishop's Observatory (IAU code 969), erected in 1836 near the house and equipped with a 7-inch Dolland refractor. Hind, Vogel, Marth, Talmage, Pogson, and Dawes observed there. The observatory closed when Bishop died in 1861, and the instruments and dome were moved to Meadowbank, Twickenham in 1863. Twickenham Observatory closed in 1877 and the instruments were given to the Royal Observatory of Naples (Osservatorio Astronomico di Capodimonte). The South Villa is now replaced by Regent's College, now one of the two largest groups of buildings in the park alongside London Zoo.

Close to the eastern edge of the park

Sir H. Taylor's Villa: demolished; site now part of the open parkland. 

A residential history of St. John's Lodge, The Holme and Hanover Lodge is to be published by the owners in 2007 along with some aspects of the litigation history surrounding these properties, including the IRA bombing of the nearby bandstand on Holme Green.

Between 1988 and 2004 six new villas were built by the Crown Estate at the north western edge of the park, between the Outer Circle and the Regent's Canal. They were designed by Quinlan Terry in a variety of traditional styles and named accordingly: the Corinthian, Gothick, Ionic, Regency, Tuscan and Veneto villas.

 Kubie Gold Associates is a Regent's Park estate agency and we hope you find this information useful.

Our Favourite Shops

Our Favourite Restaurants

Ping Pong  (Chinese)
10 Paddington Street, Marylebone, London W1U 5QL

Occo  (African)
58 Crawford Street, Marylebone, W1H 4JW

Fairuz (Lebanese)
3 Blandford Street, Marylebone,  W1U 3DA

Galvin Bistrot Deluxe (French)
66 Baker Street, Marylebone, W1U 7DH

Sea Shell  (English)
49/51 Lisson Grove, London, Marylebone, NW1 6UH 

Our Favourite Pubs and Bars

Our Favourite Walks

Within its 166 hectares (410 acres) Regent's Park is amazingly diverse in terms of what it has to offer visitors. Ranging from wide-open playing fields and wildflower grassland to more secluded woodland, wetland and reedbeds. One very important element of the management of the Park is a focus on the conservation and enhancement of biodiversity. Over the past twenty years, the management of the Park has concentrated on meeting both the needs of the public and those of its wildlife. As a result, the Park is an important site for wildlife, which also benefits from the stunning collections such as the Queen Mary Gardens and the Rose Gardens. The Park is particularly popular amongst bird watchers as one of the richest sites in London.

 Thank you for reading this information brought to you by estate agent in Regents Park, Kubie Gold Associates.

Kubie Gold Associates strives for the utmost in both truthfulness and accuracy. No warranty, endorsement, legal sanction or other representation is or will be officially given to any information or external link provided by this site. Information and external links are provided purely as a convenience. Should any content from area guide information or an external link prove questionable, please contact us.