's colour coded property map. Red = Middle-class. Well-to-do. Gold = Upper-middle and Upper class. Wealthy. As shown, the district dates to at least the 1890s when this map was made. The name is derived from French
bel assis meaning "well situated". The area has many thoroughfares bearing its name:
Belsize Avenue, Belsize Court, Belsize Crescent, Belsize Gardens, Belsize Grove,
Belsize Lane, Belsize
Mews, Belsize Park (the road),
Belsize Park Gardens, Belsize Place, Belsize Square, and Belsize Terrace. The Manor of Belsize dates back to 1317, when as a subdivision to the Manor of
Hampstead it was left to the
Roman Catholic monks of
Westminster Abbey. The original manor consisted of a number of subdivided farms, which were rented out for income. After the
Reformation,
King Henry VIII returned the estate to the
Anglican Dean of Westminster Abbey. By 1600, including the
manor house of
Belsize House there were at least three other properties on the estate, with diplomat and courtier
Sir Isaac Wake (1581 – 1632) having a substantial property built on the west side of the main London to Hampstead road. Inherited by his daughter and her husband,
Charles West (1626–1687), the fifth
Baron de la Warr, by 1714 it had passed through various hands into the ownership of
William Paget, the
6th Baron Paget, who had a substantial formal garden constructed. The name Belsize Park comes from the 17th-century manor house and parkland (built by
Daniel O'Neill for his wife, the
Countess of Chesterfield) which once stood on the site. Rebuilt in 1663, it was sublet by 1721, when the parklands opened as pleasure gardens for those looking to escape the dirt and grime of the City of London, with concerts, singing, dancing and country sports such as fishing and racing. In 1722 magistrates were instructed to act to stop riotous behaviour, although the parkland remained open until 1745. Belsize House was rebuilt in 1746, after which additional large country houses were built on the surrounding farmlands for wealthy lawyers and merchants. Between 1679 and 1714, the number of houses on the estate had increased from 8 to 14, and by 1808 there were still only 22 recorded. However, the formal division of the estate in 1808 into eight separate parcels of land, based on the structure of the underleases of the estate's formal houses, allowed the church to maximise its income, by allowing additional substantial houses to be built on the lands. This income allowed the church to have Belsize House rebuilt in 1812 for additional letting income. The wealthy leaseholders soon enabled themselves to purchase the freehold from the church, allowing the accelerated development of Belsize as a Victorian country urban suburb of London. One of the new landowners, George Todd, redeveloped what was known as the White House in 1815 as a substantial Georgian
stucco villa with
portico and two lodges. Known as Belsize House. It was later sold to
Matthew Forster (1786–1869), the
Whig MP for
Berwick-upon-Tweed, as Belsize Lodge; it was demolished in 1937.
Victorian era Victorian development started along the main London to Hampstead road from 1815 through the works of Edward Bliss, a self-made man who had leased and then bought the Newman's House land, on the west side of Haverstock Hill north of England's Lane. Bliss not only built properties to lease out, but also allowed construction subleases. In 1829
Eton College advertised villa-sized plots on Haverstock Hill. The college then started developing an axis road to Finchley Road, naming it after
Queen Adelaide. Development halted in the 1830s due to the proposal for the lines of the
London and Birmingham Railway (L&BR) to be built through Belsize Park, but Eton College successfully lobbied for the railway to be tunnelled underground via
Primrose Hill, which was then designed and engineered by
Robert Stephenson. All the 38 houses on the Newman's House land had been built by 1830. The passing of the
Ecclesiastical Leases Act 1842 allowed all church lands to be let on long term construction leases, which unlocked the accelerated urban development of Belsize Park. The opening in 1851 of
Hampstead Road railway station on the L&BR prompted William Lund in 1852 to agree a 99-year construction sublease on the former Forsyth estate. He proposed developments to the west of Haverstock Hill, although his plans were curtailed by construction issues associated with building over both the
Pond Street sewer and the L&BR tunnel. In 1852 Charles James Palmer, a
Bloomsbury-based solicitor bought the lease of Belsize House. In 1853 he proposed demolition of the main house, with Daniel Tiley taking the lead role in constructing Belsize Square and associated properties. Palmer commissioned architect
James Piers St Aubyn to design
St Peter's Church. In 1864 the church bought back the lease on the undeveloped backlot of the Bliss lands. Tiley gained agreement from Palmer and Eton College to buy the construction lease from the church, and hence extend development south of Belsize Square to connect with the college's estate. Mimicking the then fashionable styles of Kensington and Bayswater, between 1851 and the late 1860s he built over 250 8-10 bedroom semi-detached
stucco houses with large porticos, aimed at the middle classes. The church undertook a similar agreement in 1857, reacquiring full control over the portion of Todd's lease north of Belsize Lane in 1865, and again selling it to Tiley. With construction almost complete, fashion changed and Tiley went bankrupt in 1870. Of the original eight parcels of land defined by the church in 1808, the three leased to Thomas Roberts remained substantially undeveloped throughout much of the Victorian era. South End Farm continued as a farmhouse, whilst although
Rosslyn House was sold in 1816 to the undertenant, it remained in place with its formal gardens until the house was demolished between 1896 and 1909. In 1855 Henry Davidson exchanged his lease for life of the Rosslyn House lands for a 99-year building lease. Due to issues associated with construction over the L&BR tunnels, in 1859 he sold Rosslyn House and its extended formal gardens to Charles Henry Lardner Woodd. Woodd decided to sublease the house out for income. Its occupiers until 1893 included
Sir Francis Freeling (1764–1836), Secretary of the
General Post Office, and
General Sir Moore Disney. Davidson developed his part of the Rosslyn lands, undertaking a mixed development of large semi-detached properties similar to Belsize Park, slowed by a lack of labour due to both the substantial development of the neighbouring Maryon Wilson land and the 1860s housing rush. Woodd endeavoured to keep the ever-encroaching tide of housing from coming too close to Rosslyn House, permitting development only on the fringes of the formal garden, such as the housing by the local architect
Horace Field on the south side of Wedderburn Road. It was only after Woodd's death in 1895, and the sale of the house to developers by his widow the following year, that development took place on the north side of Wedderburn Road and elsewhere on the garden and site of the house. At 19-21
Lyndhurst Road (1898) the development incorporated the gatehouse of Rosslyn House, designed for Woodd by
S. S. Teulon, the architect of
St Stephen's Church, Rosslyn Hill. . Developing housing resulted in the need for improved transport facilities, including
Hampstead Heath,
Finchley Road, and
Swiss Cottage stations. From 1873 William Willett (the father of
William Willett the tireless promoter of
British Summer Time, who helped his father from 1881 onwards) took over the church's leases after the bankruptcy of Daniel Tiley. Willett redeveloped much of the former Eton College estate with newer, smaller but still substantial properties inspired by
Queen Anne style architecture. By 1900, most of the residual country mansions and their gardens had been demolished, to make way for smaller terraced houses.
Modern era After
World War I, the construction of blocks of
flats began, and now a great many of the larger houses are also converted into flats. In
World War II, a large underground
air-raid shelter was built here, and its entrance can still be seen near the tube station at Downside Crescent. The area on Haverstock Hill north of
Belsize Park Underground station up to
Hampstead Town Hall and including part of a
primary school near the
Royal Free Hospital was heavily bombed. When the area was rebuilt, the opportunity was taken to widen the pavement and build further back from the road. ==Cultural references==