page_title: Ladbroke Estate
section_title: The Hippodrome
hierarchical_section_title: Ladbroke Estate / The Hippodrome
caption_attribution_description: Environs of London by Davies, 1841
context_page_description: The Ladbroke Estate was a substantial estate of land owned by the Ladbroke family in Notting Hill, London, England, in the early 19th century that was gradually developed and turned into housing during the middle years of the century, as London expanded. Characterized by terraces of stuccoed brick houses backing onto large private garden squares, much of the original building remains intact today, and now forms the heart of one of London's most expensive and fashionable neighbourhoods.
context_section_description: The building boom of the 1820s did not last, and by the early 1830s new development had ground to a halt. From 1834-1838 no new building leases were granted. However, in 1837 the entrepreneur John Whyte leased 140 acres (0.57 km²) of land from the estate and proceeded to enclose "the slopes of Notting Hill and the meadows west of Westbourne Grove" with a 7-foot (2.1 m) high wooden paling. The result was the Hippodrome, a bold and ultimately unsuccessful attempt to build a race course to rival Epsom and Ascot. Unfortunately, the race course was not a financial success and it closed in 1842.
  By this time, conditions for building had once again become favourable, and development resumed, crescents of stuccoed houses being built on Whyte's circular race track. James Weller Ladbroke died in 1847, but building continued until almost all the available land had been developed by the 1870s.
caption: 1841 map of the Environs of London, showing John Whyte's Hippodrome on the upper left hand side.
exif: {}