| Summary : Underground railway station which replaced Lords station. Part of the 1935 New Works Programme included an extension of the Bakerloo tube from Baker Street to Finchley Road and on to Stanmore to relieve conjestion on the Metropolitan main-line and the Edgware branch of the Northern line. One of the two stations on the new tube was St John's Wood. Tunnelling started in 1936, and the extension opened on 20th November 1939. In compliance with a future road widening scheme, Stanley Heaps designed the station to be set back from the existing frontage lines, and the forecourt thus formed was given over to lawns and flower beds. Low wings contained a refreshment buffet and kiosks flanked the cylindrical tricket hall. The buffet later became a pub and after a period of disuse has now been rebuilt as a shop. A single entrance with swing doors was provided. The structural steel frame was designed to be strong enough to take a future superstructure. Exterior walls were of brown brick on a plinth of polished granite, and the entrance surround was faced with dark blue tiles. Clerestory windows of thick glass lenses between stone mullions lit the ticket hall. Faience slabs were carried up to the ring beam with brown bricks above. Platform tunnels incorporated an innovation: walls were finished in tiles with the station name and Underground symbol repeated in a continuous frieze at a height which could be seen from the cars. On 1st May 1979 St John's Wood became an intermediate station on the new Jubilee line when it took over the Bakerloo line branch from Baker Street to Stanmore as part of its new line to Charing Cross. |