Montpellier Rotunda is a Grade I listed building in Montpellier, Cheltenham, England.[1]
In 1809, Henry Thompson constructed a wooden pavilion with a colonnade as part of the wider development of the "Montpellier Spa" on land previously known as Trafalgar Field.[2] By 1817 it had been rebuilt in stone as the Montpellier Spa became increasingly popular. Thompson employed the architect George Allen Underwood, who completed the building with a statue of a crouching lion on the parapet.[3]
In 1826, Henry Thompson's son Pearson Thompson asked John Buonarotti Papworth to oversee the project and it was during this period that the dome was erected.[2] The dome is inspired by Rome's Pantheon and has almost identical proportions.[4] [3] The building was used as a pumproom, with water from local wells, and ballroom with an additional billiard room and reading room.[2]
Concerts were held in the building including Jenny Lind in 1848 and the first performance of a Scherzo by local composer Gustav Holst in 1891.
The Spa and surrounding gardens were purchased by the Cheltenham Borough Council in 1893.[2] The building was designated as a Grade I listed building in 1955. During the 1960s the council and Lloyds Bank undertook restoration work.[2]
Since 2017 it has housed a restaurant in The Ivy collection,[5] who undertook restoration work.[6]
The building has limestone walls with a copper roof. The front of the building has a colonnade of doric columns, a frieze of alternating square and rectangular panels and a parapet. The central wooden dome in the assembly room is coffered internally and has light entering via the lantern in the centre. The room is high and across.