The street which is now called Exmouth Market came into existence in 1816–21. It was built along with a terrace of shop–houses intended to be a shopping centre for a new housing estate which had just been built by the Northampton Estate nearby.
The new road was named Exmouth Street in 1816. It was named after Edward Pellew – Viscount Exmouth – who had just achieved great popularity by winning a battle at Algiers which enforced a treaty abolishing the slavery of Christians in Algeria.
There were already in existence a row of ten large houses known as Braine’s Row, which had been created in 1766. These found themselves on the south side of the new road.
Two events in the 19th century had a huge impact on Exmouth Street. In the 1860s, the route of the new Metropolitan Railway cut through Exmouth Street. The way they built underground tunnels was to demolish the houses on the surface, dig an open tunnel to construct the railway, and then build the surface back over the top, with new houses. The houses were rebuilt in the 1870s.
But then the second big event arrived. A new arterial road called Rosebery Avenue was created in the 1890s, and the houses were all knocked down again.
The development of Rosebery Avenue as a major traffic route left Exmouth Street as a bit of a backwater. It was decided to establish a street market there. The street market became hugely successful. Originally it was opposed by the shop owners, but in fact it had the effect of increasing their trade as well.
So far as properties are concerned, most of the houses which had been built along the street in Georgian times survived. There was some redevelopment in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, including some factories and also new flats above shops. The major piece of construction was the building of the Church of the Holy Redeemer. This replaced Spa Fields Chapel which had previously stood on the site. (It had a ‘pantheon’ dome like the one in Rome.)
After Rosebery Avenue had been completed, a triangle of land on the corner with Rosebery Avenue was left. It was decided not to build on it but to create open space with trees and seating, this was opened up in 1899, and was known simply as “Plot of Land”. It still exists today.
Someone at the council had a brilliant idea, which of course didn’t work. They installed a large iron ‘refreshment lamp’. This was the invention of the Pluto Hot Water Syndicate. It was both a new lamp and a vending machine. For a halfpenny, the vending machine would provide a cup of tea, or coffee, or cocoa, or boiling water. As with vending machines throughout history, it didn’t work properly, and it was taken out again later that year. The refreshment lamp has never been heard of again. But today we have lamps combined with car charging points. Maybe the refreshment lamp’s time has finally come.
The market continued to be a big success in the 20th century. The name of the street was formally changed to Exmouth Market in 1938. The popularity of the market attracted bigger retailers to the shops, and some of the occupiers included Midland Bank, Woolworths, David Greggs, and Lipton’s.
The market declined – more like collapsed – in the 1970s, and the shops to lost their popularity. By 1984, only 6 of the 100 market pitches were still occupied by stalls.
Islington Council made a big effort to revive the market in the 1980s putting money into repaving the street. But the relaunch was not a success. The commercial activity declined but the properties became protected – in 1992, the properties in the street were made part of a new Rosebery Avenue Conservation Area.
Private enterprise had more success in reviving the market. Most of the freeholds of the properties in Exmouth market belonged to the Northampton Estate. After the Second World War they sold most of their properties to Debenhams Property Trust, who became the main freehold owner in Exmouth Market. They created a new initiative to regenerate the market, alongside Islington Council. In the 1996, Islington changed the planning policy for the area to allow greater freedom to use properties for a wider spectrum of businesses. Pavements were widened and new lamps were introduced.
Exmouth Market began to take off when Moro opened its restaurant in 1997. They were soon followed by other large operators, including Pizza Express, Starbucks and Subway, although those have since gone.
The result has been more a case of gentrification then revival of the former working class market. The properties were gradually taken over by specialist and individual traders with bars, restaurants, and interesting shops, as it is today.
The street market and the shops have always tended to prosper or suffer, hand in hand. On the back of the new popularity, the Exmouth Market Traders Association managed to stage a revival of the street market as well.
The north side of Exmouth Market
The island block comprising Nos. 11–21 Exmouth Street (and also Nos. 46–54 Rosebery Avenue) was built in 1930 as a factory and shop. The buildings are four-storey high and have red-brick facades.
There had previously been a pub at No. 23 Exmouth Market, but in 1916 it was rebuilt as the Exmouth Arms for the Camden Brewery (It looks older because it was given a Georgian look.) When it was taken over by Courage in the 1930s they tampered with the green-tile panel on the corner to add their name. The Exmouth Arms is currently undergoing refurbishment.
Nos. 25, 27 and 29 Exmouth Market all look very similar buildings, but No. 29 looks older. In fact, they were all built together in 1817 – 21, but Nos. 25 and 27 were later ‘refronted’ (the façades were rebuilt) probably in the 1920s. No. 29 is apparently the least altered of the set.
No. 25 Exmouth Market was western-most house of the terrace constructed in 1817-21 which eventually extended to No. 57 Exmouth Market.
Nos. 33 -39 Exmouth Market were all built together in 1817-21, and they still retain much of their original appearance, above ground floor level. But Nos. 37 and 39 were combined for a while as a single property and their façades were ‘refronted’ (the façades were rebuilt) in 1924.
Nos. 41 – 43 Exmouth Market looked very much to me as if they had been built together – although clearly No. 43 had subsequently been covered in render and had the windows ‘modernised’. And it is true that they were built together as part of the terrace constructed in 1817-21. But they were each part of separate projects. However, they both followed the same basic design, and were not given attics.
Nos. 49 – 51 Exmouth Market (also No. 47 which is currently being restored) are unusual in this part of the terrace in that they have attic storeys. These are not the originals. The attics storeys have been rebuilt and enlarged in recent decades. The properties were all built as part of the terrace constructed in 1817-21 stretching from No. 25 to No. 57 Exmouth Market, although the individual houses were built by different builders. In the 19th century, the main developer would usually sub-contract or lease parts of the overall scheme to other, often very small-time, builders.
Nos. 53 – 55 Exmouth Market built, along with the brick-faced houses in the terrace, in 1817-21, but the fronts were subsequently stuccoed or rendered and then painted. They were built without attic storeys. No. 55 Exmouth Market was damaged by German bombing in the First World War and had to partially rebuilt in 1918. We are all used to the fact that many buildings in London were destroyed by ‘the Blitz’ in the Second World War. It seems hard to believe that London suffered significant bomb damage in the First World War. Did they drop bombs by hand from their bi-planes or from balloons?
Nos. 59 – 61 Exmouth Market was built for David Greig, a chain of grocers, in 1924.
The buildings of Nos. 65 – 69 Exmouth Market were originally built in the mid-19th century but they have clearly been substantially modernised and refurbished in recent times.
The south side of Exmouth Market
The corner block including No. 2 Exmouth Market was built in 1873 after the previous buildings on the site had been knocked down to make way for the Metropolitan Railway’s tunnel which runs underneath. No. 2 was built with the Clerkenwell Tavern by George Day, a Camden builder, who then gave up building to run the public house. In later years No.. 2, Exmouth Market was incorporated in the pub. It is an interesting feature of pubs constructed around this time in Clerkenwell (perhaps elsewhere too) that it was common to build them on corners and give them a rounded front. You will see it in the pub in Turnmill Street and the building (which once contained a pub) on the corner of Clerkenwell Green.
No. 4 Exmouth Market was one of the properties which was built in the late 1860s, after the former No. 4 had been knocked down to make way for the Metropolitan Railway. It was built with yellow stock brick, with stucco architraves framing the upper windows.
The red-brick faced block of flats at Nos 6–10 Exmouth Market (called City Mansions) was built in 1903–4 as shops with flats above.
Exmouth House at Nos. 12 – 22 Exmouth Market is a large block between Pine Street and the Holy Redeemer Roman Catholic church. It was built in 1931 as shops and workspaces – mini-factories. Original tenants of workspaces on the upper floors included manufacturers of loud-speakers and corset makers. In the 1994 it was refurbished and modernised as offices. The shop on the corner – No. 12 – used to be a bank, which is why the front is all faced in stone. Stone facings were always a requirement for bank buildings – to emphasise weight and dependability.
The full name of the church is the ‘Church of Our Most Holy Redeemer’. It is a Roman Catholic church. It was designed by J. D. Sedding. Work began in 1878 and lasted until 1895. The campanile (tower) and the clergy house was designed by Sedding’s former assistant, Henry Wilson, and built in 1906. He also later extended the main building.
The nine former houses at Nos. 28–44 Exmouth Market are among the oldest buildings in the street. A plaque on the front of No. 34 Exmouth Market says, ‘Brayne’s Buildings 1765’. Joseph Brayne, a stone mason by trade, took a sub-lease in 1763 of the land for these buildings from Thomas Rosoman who himself had a 90 year lease on a larger tract of land. The houses were all built with three storeys and basements. Very little of the original appearance of the houses has survived the centuries. All of them have had their fronts rebuilt at one time or another – apart from No. 34 Exmouth Market where the the front is still original but buried under a stuccoed facing. The front of No. 30 Exmouth Market was rebuilt before the First World War, but much of the rebuilding has been relatively recent – 1980 is estimated for No. 36 Exmouth Market.
Mansard roofs to many of the houses in the terrace were a much later addition, again spanning the centuries although they look similar – from 1836 at No. 34 Exmouth Market to 1991 at No. 36 Exmouth Market.
Nos 42 and 44 are the only members of ‘Brayne’s Row’ which have been completely rebuilt, but the date is unknowns. The new houses copied the appearance of the buildings they replaced.
The first intrepid colonist of this part of Clerkenwell was Richard Ambler, ‘a Clerkenwell gentleman’ as he is described, so a man already familiar with the area. In 1763 he took a plot of land from Thomas Rasoman and had No. 46 Exmouth Market built there as his residence. His lease and his house pre-date the terrace of ‘Brayne’s Buildings’ built by Joseph Brayne in 1765. No. 46 Exmouth Market is the earliest surviving building in the street. As originally built, Ambler’s house had a 47 ft frontage that included the site of today’s Nos. 48 and 50 Exmouth Market. The house became sub-divided over the centuries. In 2001 the upper storeys of Nos. 46 and 48 Exmouth Market were converted to flats, and a mansard floor was added.
Nos. 48 and 50 Exmouth Market were built in 1834. Most of the terraced houses in Exmouth Market were built as just that – houses – but over time were converted to accommodate shops on the ground floors. Nos. 48 and 50 Exmouth Market, however, were built to be shop-houses. Nos. 48 and 50 Exmouth Market were built at the same time, when the plots became available, but they were constructed by different builders to different specifications. No. 50 more or less copied the form of the surrounding terraces with two full storeys above the shop. No 48 was more modest, with only one full storey above the shop, and garrets in the roof.
No. 54 Exmouth Market was built in 1792 as a ground floor with two upper storeys. In the 1860s a two-storey extension was added where a passage to a house behind had once existed. That is now No. 52 Exmouth Market.
No. 56 Exmouth Market has a blue plaque commemorating Joseph Grimaldi, the famous clown, who lived at the property in 1818 – 1828.
No. 56 Exmouth Market was built in 1766, together with No. 58 Exmouth Market. No. 56 still has its original staircase. In the early nineteenth century the first-floor windows were increased in size (much nearer the floor). These houses were larger than the terraced houses built three years earlier by Joseph Brayne. They are four storeys high (but no attic floors) and they are wider than the other houses. No. 60 Exmouth Market was built about 1780, also with three storeys above the shop and no attics. Parts of the walls of No. 56 Exmouth Market had to be rebuilt in 1925. The whole of the frontage of No. 58 Exmouth Market has been rebuilt.
Nos. 62 – 70 Exmouth Market and buildings behind were built as a single development in 1898, but they didn’t have the appearance they have today. A later owner of the public house on the corner employed architects to refashion them all in a style known as Wrenaissance, which involved the red brick facades with contrasting stone dressings and monumental jutting cornices which we see today. There’s a gap for a passage between Nos. 62 and 64 Exmouth Market. Originally, the development was all part of the ‘London Spa’ and that name survives as the name ‘London Spa Court’ given to the flats above the former public house.
