Dolphin Square

Dolphin Square is a block of private flats and business complex built near the River Thames at Pimlico in London, between 1935 and 1937. At one time, the huge development was home to more than 70 MPs, and at least 10 Lords.

At the time of its construction the development of 1,250 up-market flats was billed, according to Sir Nikolaus Pevsner as the "largest self-contained block of flats in Europe" and, to an extent, their design has been a model for later municipal developments.

The Dolphin Square development is situated on the former works of the developer and builder Thomas Cubitt, who created the surrounding Pimlico district in the 19th-century. An Army clothing factory was built on the site after Cubitt's death, standing until 1933, when the leasehold on the site reverted to the Duke of Westminster. An American company, the Frederick French Corporation, bought the freehold for the site from the Duke, with plans to build a large residential development, Ormonde Court. The precarious financial situation of the Frederick French Corporation resulted in the sale of the site to Richard Rylands Costain (founder of the nascent Costain Group), who began construction on his own development in 1935.

A. P. Herbert, "Dolphin Square", 1935 (illustrations by H. M. Bateman) described the Square as 'a city of 1,250 flats, each enjoying at the same time most of the advantages of the separate house and the big communal dwelling place'; the provision of a restaurant made him fear that 'fortunate wives will not have enough to do. A little drudgery is good for wives, perhaps. The Dolphin lady may be spoiled'. This promotional booklet was produced for Costains. On purchasing the site, Costain remarked to a colleague: ‘in two or three years we'll either drive up to this spot in a Rolls-Royce, or we'll be standing here selling matches’.

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