place name
Thomas Sheraton (1751 – October 22, 1806), the world-famous cabinet maker and designer who lived at nearby Wardour Street, at the time a renowned furnishing centre, between 1793 – 1795, and then in this street between 1798 – 1800. Sheraton, who was born in Stockton-on-Tees, County Durham, was a leader and preacher of the Stockton Baptist church before being apprenticed to a local cabinet maker and later moving to London, aged 39, in 1790. He gave his name to a style of furniture characterised by a refinement of late Georgian styles and is associated with the styles of furniture fashionable in the 1790s and early 19thCentury. The house where he designed his furniture is now marked with a blue plaque. The street was renamed from Little Chapel Street, after the French Huguenot chapel which was built at the corner with Great Chapel Street in 1694, in the early 20thCentury. The chapel was used by the local French Huguenot population which had arrived in Britain from around 1685 to escape the religious persecutions under King Louis XIV and survived up until 1894.
