Mansion House is the official residence of the Lord Mayor of London. It is a Grade I listed building.[1] Designed by George Dance in the Palladian style, it was built primarily in the 1740s.

The Mansion House is used for some of the City of London's most formal official functions, including two annual white tie dinners. At the Easter banquet, the main speaker is the Foreign Secretary, who then receives a reply from the Dean of the Diplomatic Corps, i.e. the longest-serving ambassador. In early June, it is the turn of the Chancellor of the Exchequer to give his "Mansion House Speech" about the state of the British economy. The most famous was Mansion House Speech of 1911 by David Lloyd George, which warned the German Empire against opposing British influence during the period leading up to the First World War.

Mansion House was built between the years of 1739 and 1752, in the Palladian style by the surveyor and architect George Dance the Elder. The Master Mason was John Deval.[2]

The site, at the east end of Poultry, London, had previously been occupied by the Stocks Market, which by the time of its closure was mostly used for the sale of herbs.[3] The construction was prompted by a wish to put an end to the inconvenient practice of lodging the Lord Mayor in one of the City livery company halls. Dance won a competition over designs solicited from James Gibbs and Giacomo Leoni, and uninvited submissions by Batty Langley and Isaac Ware.[4] Construction was slowed down by the discovery of springs on the site, which meant piles had to be sunk to lay adequate foundations.[3]

The original building had two clerestory roof extensions, nicknamed the "Mayor's Nest" (a pun on "mare's nest") and "Noah's Ark". In 1795 George Dance the Younger re-roofed the central courtyard, and had the "Noah's Ark" demolished. In the same year, the original grand staircase was removed to make way for a further two rooms. In 1835 the entrance steps were reduced to one flight, and in 1842 the "Mayor's Nest" was demolished after the ballroom was reconstructed. The Lord Mayor's private entrance in Walbrook was created in 1845, and in 1849 the former Swordbearer's Room was converted into the Justice Room, effectively the magistrates' court of the City, until 1999 when the court removed to a building on the opposite side of Walbrook.[5]

From 1873, with the Lord Mayor as its president, committee meetings of the Metropolitan Hospital Sunday Fund met at Mansion House.[6][7]