Unspecified/General

Standing in isolated grandeur at Hyde Park Corner, Apsley House was once so prominently the first building travellers reached on entering London from the west that it earned the simple address Number One London. Built in the 1770s to designs by Robert Adam and later remodelled and faced in Bath stone, the mansion is famous as the London home of Arthur Wellesley, the first Duke of Wellington, the soldier and statesman who defeated Napoleon at Waterloo and twice served as prime minister. The house remains the residence of his descendants, but the principal state rooms are open to the public and preserve the duke's magnificent collection much as he arranged it. Within hang paintings by Velazquez, Rubens, Goya and other masters, many of them captured from the French and later confirmed as gifts by a grateful Spanish crown, displayed alongside porcelain, silver, sculpture and the trophies of a remarkable military career. The opulent Waterloo Gallery, where the duke held an annual banquet to mark his great victory, is among the finest interiors of its kind in the city, and a colossal nude statue of Napoleon by Canova stands incongruously at the foot of the staircase. Now cared for as a public museum, the house offers an intimate encounter with the taste and triumphs of one of the defining figures of the age. Tickets can be booked online or at the door, an audio guide explains the collection, and the central location beside the park makes it easy to combine with other attractions throughout the year across every season of the calendar. The juxtaposition of the great victor of Waterloo with the towering statue of his defeated adversary captures the complicated respect of the age, and the house as a whole offers an unusually personal portrait of a national hero through the things he gathered around him. Because it remains partly a family home, the rooms retain a lived-in quality that distinguishes them from the more institutional grandeur of larger museums. Set on the edge of one of the city's great royal parks and surrounded by the rush of modern traffic, the mansion is a tranquil pocket of history, and its compact scale makes it an ideal visit to combine with a walk in the park or a tour of the nearby attractions.

Type: Tourist Attraction

Address: 149 Piccadilly, Hyde Park Corner, London, United Kingdom

Telephone: +44 20 7499 5676

Website: https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/apsley-house/

Opening Date: 01/01/1778