34 Tite Street – Oscar Wilde’s House
Where he wrote everything, and from which he never came back
Oscar Wilde lived at 34 Tite Street from 1884 until the night of his arrest in April 1895 – eleven years in which he wrote The Importance of Being Earnest, An Ideal Husband, The Picture of Dorian Gray and most of his best work. The house was decorated by E.W. Godwin in the Aesthetic style; Wilde lived here with his wife Constance and their two sons. In the same street lived the painters Whistler and Sargent – Tite Street was the street of the Aesthetic Movement.
On 5 April 1895 Wilde left this house for the Cadogan Hotel, following his disastrous libel trial. He refused to take the train to France, and was arrested that afternoon. He never came back. His furniture was auctioned, his letters burned, his name scrubbed from the door. English Heritage has placed a blue plaque here.