Pillar of society

Bravery, bold plans and a good head for numbers helped Thomas Cubitt shape much of London, but he also aided schools, churches and charities, finds Carla Passino

- Carla Passino

TWO olive trees guard the door of the Thomas Cubitt pub in Belgravia, their sharp, narrow leaves silvery against the pretty sage-green front. Inside, waiters balance velvety chocolate cakes and trembling panna cottas as they weave their way among the tables and the barman plucks a bottle from a laden cabinet to work his alchemy into a cocktail. Taking in the scene from the panelled walls are two portraits of a long-whiskered gentleman clad in a fashionable black coat. He is Thomas Cubitt, the man who gave the pub its name—and much of central London its meringue-white buildings.

That he managed to do any of it is almost a miracle. Cubitt didn’t have an easy start in life. He was only 19, a journeyman for a Norfolk carpenter, when his father died, leaving the family in straitened financial circumstances. Determined to improve his lot in life, he set sail for India as a captain’s joiner and managed to save enough money to open his own carpenter’s business in London in 1810, bringing two of his brothers—William, later an MP, and Lewis, who would go on to design London Bridge station—into the fold.