Neighbourhood guide · SW3
Chelsea
Painted mews, red-brick mansion blocks and the river a few streets away.
Chelsea grew up along the river as a village of painters and writers, and it still has their houses: studios on the side streets, red-brick mansion blocks and painted cottages a few streets from the King's Road.
Living in Chelsea
The village by the river
For most of its history Chelsea was a riverside village outside London. Sir Thomas More had a house here, Wren built the Royal Hospital, and in the nineteenth century the painters arrived: Turner, Whistler and Rossetti all lived within a few hundred yards of Cheyne Walk.
They left behind a particular kind of house. Studios with tall north windows, built for painters and now prized for their light, sit on streets such as Mallord Street and Glebe Place. Between them are rows of small painted cottages, and to the north the large red-brick mansion blocks of the 1890s.
Life here moves between the King's Road and the river. On Saturdays the food market at Duke of York Square is busy from early morning, the Physic Garden opens its gate on Swan Walk, and across the Albert Bridge lies Battersea Park. Families like Chelsea for its schools and gardens; others for the fact that a weekday evening can feel like a weekend.
Streets we know
Four of our favourites
I
Cheyne Walk
The river terrace, with blue plaques for painters and writers along its length.
II
Mallord Street
Quiet studio houses, among them one built for the painter Augustus John.
III
Burnsall Street
Small painted houses a few steps from the King's Road.
IV
Paultons Square
A complete Georgian square with a private garden in the middle.
On the map
Chelsea, close up
The houses we are selling here and the places our buyers ask about first: parks, shops, stations and the odd museum.
Good to know
Before you move
Painted houses on Burnsall Street.
Boy with a Dolphin, David Wynne's sculpture on the embankment.
For sale and sold
Homes in Chelsea
Off market
Not everything is listed
Tell us what you are looking for in Chelsea and we will call you before a house comes to market.
From the journal
Stories from Chelsea
Keep exploring
Other neighbourhoods
Selling in Chelsea?
We know who is looking here
A partner visits, walks every floor and gives you a written valuation within five working days.