Now, I thought that the trusty flat-pack furniture I’ve had kicking about since I started university was doing well for its age. But it truly pales in comparison to what you’ll find hidden inside Sambourne House. Every item within this townhouse-turned-museum has been perfectly preserved since the 1800s. So, if you like noseying around other people’s gaffs even half as much as I do, I’d highly recommend you making a beeline to Holland Park when you next get the chance.
Sambourne House
Sambourne House is, undoubtedly, one of the best-preserved Victorian houses in the UK. And if you’ve ever wondered what life in London was like back then, this picture-perfect pad is probably as close as you’ll get to finding out (without having to locate a time machine, that is).
The house was built in 1868, done up by Edward Linley Sambourne in the 1870s, and lived in by him and his family for 35 years. Sambourne was a celebrated cartoonist, illustrator, and photographer. In fact, he worked as the Chief Cartoonist at Punch Magazine; the publication that’s credited with coining ‘cartoons’ as we know them today. So yes, he was a rather artistic man – and his creativity is very much splashed and sprinkled throughout the house to this very day.
Sambourne and his wife decked out the house in the popular-at-the-time ‘Aesthetic Style’. We’re talking stained-glass windows and Morris & Co wallpaper. For the 35 years he resided there, he truly made the house his own. Following the deaths of him and his wife, Sambourne House (at the time just known as 18 Stafford Terrace) was passed onto their children. And it’s the two of them that we have to thank for the fact that the house is now open to the public as a museum.
Sambourne House is now in the care of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, and sits as an almost entirely intact time capsule of Victorian living. Every feature, furnishing, window and wallpaper piece is a genuine item from when the home was lived in by the Sambournes, offering an unparalleled glimpse into the past.
You can have a peek inside the old washroom, the powder room, and even the housemaid’s bedroom. It’s the kind of place that you could step inside multiple times and still discover something new with each visit. And look, I know that the term ‘hidden gem’ gets thrown about far too liberally these days. But if anywhere were able to define the meaning of the phrase, it’s this.
You’ll find Sambourne House at 18 Stafford Terrace, W8 7BH. Find out more and plan your visit here.