Illustrious Chiswick Mall home becomes most expensive W4 property ever

It provided the setting for Miss Pinkerton's Seminary for Young Ladies, where Becky Sharp fatefully made the acquaintance of Amelia Sedley in Vanity Fair and now it has smashed all records for prices achieved for a property in W4.

Walpole House, which must stand high on any shortlist of the finest and most covetable terrace houses in London, has been sold for £7,250,000 by agents Knight Frank shattering the previous record of £3,210,000 that was paid for 41 South Parade earlier this year.

Set on Chiswick’s most illustrious and expensive road, Chiswick Mall, and with a panorama of the Thames both upstream and downstream, Walpole House takes its name from the Hon Thomas Walpole (nephew of Sir Robert Walpole, England’s first Prime Minister) who lived there from 1798 till 1803. Thackeray studied there and used it as the model for Miss Pinkerton’s Academy in Vanity Fair.

Staithe House (picture right), also located on Chiswick Mall, was sold for a record £3,525,000 just a fortnight earlier just topping the price achieved for Melbourne House on South Parade which, according to Tony D'Alton of Knight Frank, was sold unmodernised for £3,220,000. 

Large houses on Chiswick Mall sell for millions of pounds making it not just Chiswick most expensive road but also one of the capital's most desirable addresses. 

If you fancy a piece of the action, the nine bedroom Georgian family home Island House located on Chiswick Mall is currently on the market for a more modest £4,500,000 or Said House (home to Sir Alan Sugar's Apprentice's in 2005) is also on the market for £5,500,000.

Top Ten All-Time Property Sales in Chiswick

The table below shows the most expensive properties to have changed hands in the Chiswick area since the Land Registry started collecting and publishing this data in April 2000. The sale of Melbourne House has yet to appear on the Land Registry figures.

Source: Land Registry

November 20, 2006