A Victorian silver-gilt presentation plaque

A Victorian silver-gilt presentation plaque, The Grand Hotel, Charing Cross,

by George Angell, part-marked, London circa 1880,

chased with a view of the Grand Hotel, Charing Cross, with the base of Nelson's Column to left and the statue of Charles I at Charing Cross to right, a carriage and hansom cab in foreground, inscribed 'A Souvenir presented to Frederick Gordon Esq.re by a few sincere friends to commemorate the completion of this; his latest Great Enterprise, May 29, 1880', mounted on a later blue velvet backed easel mount, diameter 24cm.

Provenance: The James Walker Collection, Christie's South Kensington, 13th July 2006, lot 241.

By early 1876, Northumberland House, built in 1605, had been demolished and a new 30 metre-wide thoroughfare created along which by the 1880's, new buildings including several hotels, The Grand, The Metropole and The Victoria, were built by the Northumberland Avenue Hotel Company. These palatial hotels were especially popular with American visitors, with their central position providing easy access to the City and the West End, to Parliament, the gentlemen's clubs and major railway termini.