Cities and housing

Behind the Terrace

In the grand terraces built for wealthy families in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century London, the imposing fronts told only half the story. Behind each row ran a narrow lane, the mews, lined with stables and coach houses, above which the coachmen and grooms lived with their families. Horses, hay and people existed [1] by jowl in a handful of cramped rooms, within sight of the drawing-room windows of those they served, yet in a world that their employers seldom entered. When the motor car made the carriage horse redundant, many mews were turned into garages or simply fell out of use, and some decayed so badly that they were regarded as little better than slums. Today, whitewashed and hung with window boxes, they are among the most sought-after addresses in the city, prized for a quality that their original occupants would scarcely have associated with them: seclusion.