No. 1 St John St, on the corner with Cowcross Street, was built in the mid-1880s in a ‘Venetian’ style It still has a wall-mounted crane, but since the building originally had a coffee shop on the ground floor not a warehouse, it may always have been decorative.
No. 3-5 St John Street was the headquarters of the sausage and mash empire of William Harris – ‘the Sausage King’ as he was known to the Press. if you look at the gable you can see there is the image of a wild boar, Harris’s name and ‘1897’, the date the building was constructed. The shop remained a butchers until the 1980s.
Harris’s sausage business also expanded into the adjoining buildings, Nos. 7 and 9 St John Street. In the 1980s, there was a private sex cinema there, where 11 people were killed in a fire in 1994.
Much of the west side of St John Street from this point until Clerkenwell Road is modern development. Nos. 11 – 33 St John Street which goes round into Peters Lane was a 1980s office development which replaced disused cold stores for the meat industry. In the stretch north of St John’s Lane, Nos. 65 – 67 St John Street are part of the Watchmaker Court development in St John’s Lane. Campion House at No. 55 St John Street is a mid-1990s office development.
There are a couple of former public houses from the 19th century which still survive, although they are no longer used as pubs. No. 57 St John Street was originally the White Bear and it was built in 1899 together with a house at No. 59 St John Street. No. 99 St John Street was the Horns public house, built in 1887.
Nos. 69 – 73 St John Street are shop-houses built in 1818. (Shop-houses were originally built with a shop on the ground floor and living accommodation above, rather than being family houses converted later in their lives to business uses.) No. 69 St John Street is the most original in appearance.
No. 105 St John Street, which incorporates No. 25 Clerkenwell Rd, may look like a post-war building but it was built in the 1890s as a warehouse and it is traditional redbrick underneath the armour of stone cladding it wears now.
The East side of St John Street connects with Charterhouse Street, and the imposing building on the corner, Nos. 2 – 6 St John Street, was built in 1872 as a high-street bank to service the local meat industry. Banks had a style which makes them instantly recognisable, although unlike this one which is still a bank, they are more recognisable as wine bars than banks these days.
At No. 16 St John Street was built in 1887 for Lovell & Christmas, who were merchants in meat products. For many years it was the Cross Keys Inn. In the 1980s it was the headquarters of the Communist Party of Great Britain. But now it’s used as offices. I hope they have checked for any MI5 microphones left in the walls.
Nos. 18 – 20 St John Street was built in 1887 as a warehouse in a rather Gothic style of architecture, with two arches several storeys high built into the façade design. It was originally occupied by sausage skin manufacturers.
Several period houses survive on the east side of St John Street. No. 22 St John Street is an early 18th-century house. No. 24 St John Street was built in 1864 on the site of the Golden Lion Inn as a house-shop with a big yard at the back. No. 26 St John Street dates from the early 19th century, although some of the fabric may go back to the 1770s. The house replaced the Swan With Two Necks Inn. From the 1890s, the building it was occupied by bacon manufacturers who eventually had six bacon smoking stoves in the yard behind. In the 1990s the building was restored and converted into St John Restaurant and Bar by the renowned chef-owner, Fergus Henderson, and he carefully incorporated the surviving bacon stoves into the design. One of them is the bar. I’ve done a separate post on smokeries in Smithfield.
George Farmiloe was a 19th century window-glass cutter, who might have disappeared into history, perhaps only to be found by someone compiling a family history. But his name lives on because he had it inscribed in big letters above the entrance of Nos. 28 – 36 St John Street. (If you look closely you will see that the original carved lettering read ‘G Farmiloe & Sons’, but after a limited company was formed in 1892, they cunningly replaced it with ‘George Farmiloe & Sons Ltd” with the lettering more squashed together.
In 1848 George Farmiloe bought Nos. 34 – 36 St John Street which comprised two shops and the former White Hart Inn with its large wagon yard at the back. He made stained glass and expanded to become a general builders merchant. Later, the company took over Nos. 28 – 32 St John Street, which had previously been the Windmill Inn. It was only in 1999 that the company finally left St John Street and moved to Mitcham. Most of the buildings were put up in the mid-1860s. The façade is in an ‘Italianate palazzo style’ in Portland stone, white Suffolk bricks, and polished Aberdeen granite.
Nos. 38 – 46 St John Street were formerly warehouses built between 1877 and 1890 with a façade of Portland stone above polished granite pilasters and with upper parts in Bath stone. Despite such extravagance, this owner missed a trick and didn’t engrave his name across it.
There is an 1830s house at No. 72 St John Street, but Nos. 48 to 76 St John Street are mainly factories and warehouses built in the 1950s and 1960s for meat industry companies who hadn’t noticed that the meat trade was retreating from the area. Nos. 52 – 54 St John Street are now a 1980s flat and office development.
No. 78 St John Street, built in 1892, was occupied by tyre manufacturers in the early 20th century. The façade has an unusual arch design spanning three floors. The ground floor incorporates an entrance into Mitre Court.
The most historic remnant of this part of St John Street is the row of Georgian houses which comprise Nos. 80 to 88 St John Street. Nos. 80 to 86 St John Street were all built in the 1700s, and No. 88 St John Street was originally a pair of houses built in about 1837. Nos. 82 and 84 St John Street were occupied by a family of leather merchants who also had workshops in Hat & Mitre Court. No. 88 St John Street was a ‘home for working girls’ in the 1880s – they managed to cram in 37 beds. Later, the premises were occupied by a firm of polishers and lacquerers. The building was refurbished in 1998 as a restaurant and an office.
Nos. 90 – 92 St John Street was built in 1926 as a warehouse or a factory but has now been converted to offices and apartments.
You are probably bored with hearing about buildings which were built as factory warehouses and then became offices. No 100 St John Street was different. It was originally a garage. It was a service and filling station for the general public, but they also repaired all kinds of vehicles – even tricycles. Like all the others, this building succumbed to the changing patterns of business of the late 20th century and is now a 1990s office block.