11-41-71 London St James Street

Image © Barclays

Taken from our newly rebuilt branch at 23 St James’ Street, this is the view across London in 1964 – much has changed on the London Skyline since then, but at the time, our Bank’s optimism is as high as some of the many skyscrapers, as we plan our 1960s expansion in the Capital. Through this, and other rare images from the time, we will discover that in the case of 23 St James’ Street Branch, we do not so much expand outwards, as upwards. Our branch has quite an exciting life. Opened in 1950 by the British Mutual Bank, it comes to us the following year when our two banks join together.

Yours Mutually …

Image © Barclays

The building starts out with this striking almost forbidding exterior, and a beautifully designed interior, which is re-vamped to bring it into line with Martins’ Branches in 1960. In this 1951 article from Martins Bank Magazine however, the talk is still of the amalgamation with British Mutual, and of meeting our new colleagues…

1951 01 MBM.jpg It is not often that we hear of a bank amalgamation these days, and the last fusion in Martins Bank took place as long ago as 1928, when the Bank of Liverpool and Martins Ltd. amalgamated with the Lancashire and Yorkshire Bank Ltd. It was, therefore, with more than ordinary interest that we learned of the negotiations which have resulted in the acquisition of the British Mutual Bank Ltd. The history of this bank is interesting.

1951 St James’s Street Staff, at the time

of the Amalgamation with British Mutual

In 1857 the British Mutual Investment Loan and Discount Company Limited was incorporated, its objects being to receive or borrow money and to grant loans but not to transact any business peculiar to a bank or an Assurance Office. The Company was acquired in 1869 by a new company called British Mutual Investment Company Limited, whose objects were to transact the business of a Loan, Discount and Banking Company. The name of the company was changed both in 1875 and 1877, and in 1882 it became the British Mutual Banking Company Limited, the title being shortened to British Mutual Bank Limited in 1945.

Since the Company first transacted banking business the Prudential Assurance Company Limited have been represented on the Board of the Bank, although their shareholding has for many years been only a small percentage of the Issued Capital. In 1950 the Bank opened its first branch in St. James's Street and also opened the first cross-channel bank on the Dover-Calais service. The Bank has built up a reputation for the skilled personal service it gives to its customers, and the amalgamation with Martins Bank will enable this policy to be continued. We feel sure that the amalgamation is pleasing to the shareholders, the customers and the staff of British Mutual Bank and should prove a valuable acquisition to Martins Bank Limited.

We visited the St. James's Street branch on February 12th to make the acquaintance of our new colleagues and we received a most cordial and friendly welcome from them all. We were very much impressed by the beauty of the interior of this branch.

The Manager's room, which is on the first floor, is approached by a handsome oak staircase and from one of its windows the scarlet-clad sentries on duty at St. James's Palace can be seen, while half a dozen of London's most famous clubs are just across the street.

Taking the stair to the manager’s Room in the 1950s will give way to something revolutionary in the 1960s…

By 1960 we have added the “Martins Look” to

the interior, but the best is still to come…

Image © Barclays

The office is spacious, with a beautiful parquet floor, and several most attractive little rooms away from the main banking hall. It was a great pleasure to meet Mr. Milne and his colleagues Mr. Adams, Mr. Gilleland and Mr. Morgan, and we were glad to meet the daughter of Mr. Marlow, until recently the General Manager of the British Mutual Bank. We are sorry that she is shortly leaving us. We were also pleased to meet Miss Cowley. On behalf of all our colleagues we would like to express our good wishes to the members of the British Mutual Bank who have now become one with us, and we shall look forward to meeting them at our various social functions from time to time.

By the early sixties, the need for a bigger, more practical and purpose built banking facility at 23 St James’s Street forces a radical re-think. It is not possible to move outwards, so we plan to take what is for us the unusual step of moving upwards, and moving our customers up with us! The biggest change of all occurs in November 1964, when as one of three towers of the new “Economist” block, St James’ Street re-opens its doors, bringing another Martins first – escalator banking!

Two views of our new building

Images © Barclays

1965 01 MBM.jpg the bank’s first escalator branch was opened to the public in November at 23, St James's Street, London, which at first may seem a strange place for such an innovation. In the long, wide gallery of that distinguished street leading down from Piccadilly to St James's Palace, one finds a variety of buildings most of which have absorbed the character of the area, whether they house wine merchants, grocers, gunmakers, publishers or clubs.

Boodle's Club, for example, is a solid, imposing building designed by Joseph Crunden 200 years ago and no doubt typical of that period: the appearance twenty feet away of a new four-storey, irregularly shaped octagonal tower comprising a great deal of glass intersected by Portland stone should be incongruous but, surprisingly, it does not strike one in this way… For one thing this new building in which our branch is situated is not violently obtrusive, possibly due to the lack of sharp corners. Moreover it is one of three new towers in the Economist block, separated by open spaces, from the centre of which one does not notice that the highest has 16 storeys. Only the smallest has a frontage onto St James's Street. At the ground floor entrance to our branch one has the choice of an escalator or one of two lifts which run up the centre of the building alongside an enclosed winding staircase.

The first floor is entirely devoted to the banking hall, the second floor to the machine room and management offices which, apart from their shape, are typical of the high contemporary standard we have come to expect in our re-designed branches. The strongroom and staff rooms are below ground.

Two views of the new banking hall

Left: On arrival on the ‘up’ escalator

Right: At the head of the ‘down’ escalator

In the banking hall the biggest of the very large windows measures 150 square feet but all are fitted with electrically operated Venetian blinds and, of course, the entire building is air-conditioned, the heating being controlled from units beneath the windows. Lighting comes from a vast glass-panelled ceiling. We first visited the branch in the darkness of early evening and later set off on an unescorted tour into the highest and lowest reaches, liking everything we saw. We called again next morning because we were still puzzled. It is not a branch where amiable housewives dump their babies on the counter, where Wellingtons and mud cover the floor on market day, or where the window cleaner clanks in with a bucket to be filled.

The working space in the main office overlooking St James’s Street with a bay window and the side of Boodle’s Club seen through the far windows.

The Staff of our new branch are pictured on the escalator itself, for this Martins Bank Magazine feature from 1965. (See also the staff gallery at the foot of this page)

It is noiseless, entirely brown or surgically white, beautifully fitted, clinically sterile and, being on the first floor and having those enormous windows, it encourages one to look down on people! Horror of horrors! When this awful thought struck us we decided to talk to Mr George Milne and his staff and soon realised that the impression was wrong and entirely due to the unusual situation.

And none of those to whom we spoke had any criticisms: rather were they full of praise for the lay-out and amenities and happy to work in such surroundings after the cramped conditions of the old No 23. So that was all right. The opinions of the architectural pundits on the new Economist block vary widely. 'An architectural miss, a townscape hit' said one.

Reaching the dizzy heights - nearby buildings

are reflected in the picture windows of No.23

Image © Barclays

'Influencing what is to come while maintaining a friendly acquaintance with the best of what will remain' wrote another: he was of course referring to the buildings, but we think it applies equally well to our branch and those who work in it.