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Hilton London Paddington

1854 establishments in EnglandGrade II listed buildings in the City of WestminsterHilton Hotels & Resorts hotelsHotels established in 1854Hotels in the City of Westminster
PaddingtonRailway hotels in EnglandUse British English from January 2018
Hilton London Paddington 1
Hilton London Paddington 1

The Hilton London Paddington, formerly the Great Western Royal Hotel, is a hotel that forms part of the Paddington Station complex in London, England. The hotel was originally the idea of Isambard Kingdom Brunel, who was the hotel's first managing director. The funding came in large part from the Directors of the Great Western Railway Company, who were persuaded by Brunel to buy shares in the project. The hotel was built on Praed Street in the early 1850s and opened on 9 June 1854 by H.R.H. The Prince Albert, Prince Consort, having taken 14 months to build. The hotel was designed by architect Philip Charles Hardwick, costing approximately £60,000 including all furnishing and fittings - a building which was 'to rival the facilities of the great hotels on the Continent'. The building effectively forms the main façade of the station, closing off the end of the train shed at the head of the terminal platforms. It was built by Messrs Holland Hannen & Cubitts, the building firm founded by Thomas Cubitt.At Paddington, Hardwick pioneered the Second Empire style for buildings of this type in England. In its original form, the hotel was extensively ornamented inside and outside, and there is a surviving allegorical sculpture in the pediment by John Thomas. The hotel was designed in the style of Louis XIV and further embellished by a figurative sculpture over the front entrance of the hotel representing Peace, Plenty, Science & Industry. Thomas was to contribute many statues and decorations in the present Palace of Westminster. The Great Western Railway originally leased the hotel to a subsidiary, the Great Western Royal Hotel Company, which was chaired by their engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel from 1855 until his death in 1859. Brunel's original idea was that a passenger wishing to travel from London to New York would enter the Great Western Royal Hotel and, from that point, be conveyed by and housed in the various undertakings controlled by the Great Western Company. This never came to pass, however, as the Great Western ship was scrapped before the hotel was completed - after the company had tendered for but failed to obtain the prized Atlantic mail contract, losing it to the Cunard Company. The 2nd Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, whose former seat was Stowe House, died as a bankrupt in the hotel in July 1861. The Duke had formerly served as a Conservative Lord Privy Seal in the early 1840s. The railway company took full control of its operation in the later nineteenth century, and in the 1930s extended and remodelled it within and without under the direction of their architect Percy Emerson Culverhouse. Norah, Lady Docker, the notorious socialite and spendthrift of the 1940s and 1950s, died in the hotel on 11 December 1983.In accordance with Government policies on privatisation of British Rail, it was sold to the private sector in 1983. It was refurbished and reopened under its present name, as part of the Hilton Hotels chain, in 2001.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Hilton London Paddington (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Hilton London Paddington
Praed Street, London Paddington

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Wikipedia: Hilton London PaddingtonContinue reading on Wikipedia

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N 51.515694444444 ° E -0.17583333333333 °
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Hilton London Paddington

Praed Street 146
W2 1HS London, Paddington
England, United Kingdom
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call+442078500500

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hilton.com

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Hilton London Paddington 1
Hilton London Paddington 1
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Great Western Railway War Memorial
Great Western Railway War Memorial

The Great Western Railway War Memorial is a First World War memorial by Charles Sargeant Jagger and Thomas S. Tait. It stands on platform 1 at London Paddington station, commemorating the 2,500 employees of the Great Western Railway (GWR) who were killed in the conflict. One-third of the GWR's workforce of almost 80,000 left to fight in the First World War, the company guaranteeing their jobs, and the GWR gave over its workshops for munitions manufacturing as well as devoting its network to transporting soldiers and military equipment. The company considered several schemes for a war memorial before approaching Jagger to design a statue. Some officials continued to push for an alternate design, to the point that Jagger threatened to resign. Jagger was working on several other war memorial commissions at the same time as the GWR's, including his most famous, the Royal Artillery Memorial. The memorial consists of a bronze statue of a soldier, dressed in heavy winter clothing, reading a letter from home. The statue stands on platform 1 of Paddington station, on a polished granite plinth within a white stone surround. The names of the dead were recorded on a roll that was buried underneath the plinth. Viscount Churchill, the company chairman, unveiled the memorial on 11 November 1922, in front of the Archbishop of Canterbury, GWR officials, and more than 6,000 relatives of the dead. Such was the expected size of the crowd that the GWR built viewing stands across two platforms and the tracks in between them. Jagger's statue was the model for a memorial to commemorate the British Army's postal service, unveiled in 1981, and for a scheme in 2014 encouraging people to write a letter as part of the First World War centenary. During the COVID-19 pandemic, local communities on the GWR network laid wreaths on trains that carried them to Paddington to be laid at the memorial for Armistice Day.

London Paddington station
London Paddington station

Paddington, also known as London Paddington, is a Central London railway terminus and London Underground station complex, located on Praed Street in the Paddington area. The site has been the London terminus of services provided by the Great Western Railway and its successors since 1838. Much of the main line station dates from 1854 and was designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel. Paddington is the London terminus of the Great Western Main Line; passenger services are primarily operated by Great Western Railway, which provides the majority of commuter and regional passenger services to west London and the Thames Valley region as well as long-distance intercity services to South West England and South Wales. The station is the eastern terminus for Heathrow Express and Elizabeth line services to Heathrow Airport; and for Elizabeth line services westwards to Reading, and eastwards to Abbey Wood. Situated in fare zone 1, it has two separate tube stations providing connections to the Bakerloo, Circle, District, and Hammersmith & City lines. It is one of 11 London stations managed directly by Network Rail. The station has been perennially popular for passengers and goods, particularly milk and parcels. Major upgrades took place in the 1870s, the 1910s and the 1960s, each trying to add additional platforms and space while trying to preserve the existing services and architecture as much as possible. Paddington was first served by London Underground trains in 1863, as the original western terminus of the Metropolitan Railway, the world's first underground railway. In the 20th century, suburban and commuter services appeared at Paddington as the urban sprawl of London moved westwards. Despite the numerous upgrades and rebuilding, plus damage sustained in particular during World War II, Brunel's original design is still recognisable.