This is a post first began in 2021 in anticipation of the completion of the Knightsbridge station upgrade project – and in view of the ongoing delays the original post has now been split up into several in order to cover the different progressions on the station’s upgrade. This past four years the main body of the original post has just sort of stayed on the side-lines while the other posts were published. The good news is the original Knightsbridge tube station – closed in February 1934 – will become part of the London Underground system once again later this month. Curiously its now some seven years or so since the 1930s replacement entrance on the corner of Brompton Road and Sloane Street shut for good. The first of the new entrances (not forgetting the earlier one which opened on the north side) on Brompton Road opened in October 2022. This will now be followed by the accessible station entrance in Hooper’s Court sometime in April 2025.
The new stairs leading to the twin lifts at the intermediate level. The escalators too involves stairs to reach those however by way of the lifts far less stairs are needed to reach street level at Hooper’s Court – thus the new route should be a boon for those who have some luggage or maybe a family and kids. The one lift will be for PRM (eg the disabled, the elderly etc). Note the modern tiling which is faithful to the station’s original 1907 colour scheme. Picture taken April 2025.
The new Knightsbridge station lift at platform level. Due to site constraints its just the one facility. However there are two lifts from the intermediate level to street level – so there’s level access from the platform to the street – though not from the train to the street. Ramps will no doubt be required until the new Piccadilly line trains (2024 tube stock) are in service when full level boarding will be implemented. Picture taken April 2025.
The new entrance in Hooper’s Court should have been open in the summer of 2021 and that should have been the culmination of the works at that station. The default opening date later became 2022, then it should have been opened in the summer of 2023. Then it was shifted to late 2023 and yet again to Spring 2024! At the time this post was last updated the the project had been running nearly three years late. Now its culminated in a four year delay – with an envisaged opening date as yet unannounced during April 2025. To be fair the new entrance in Brompton Road was opened in the Autumn of 2022 and that was just a year or so late.
London Rail has two previous posts – one covers the station in general including the old buildings, and the new entrance in Hooper’s Court: Knightsbridge station 2022. The other covered the opening of the new Brompton Road entrance: New Knightsbridge station entrance opens.
The station entrance and lift lobbies in Hooper’s Court, just off Brompton Road. The whole installation has been fully operational for nigh on a year or so! Picture taken November 2024.
The upgrade meant Knightsbridge would be getting two brand new entrances and a repurposed original 1906 station complete with lifts – and part of the former Leslie Green building of 1907 would be restored too! Since the 1930s this had been used for other purposes including a hotel and the ox blood frontage had been removed – much like what happened at Holborn too. It must be said the original station buildings to the rear in Basil Street where the lifts once were isn’t in use now – even though it has been restored. Even though the new lifts use the original lift shafts, it was not possible to use the original station entrance thus a new one was built in Hooper’s Court and the surprise is it has been built in the style of Leslie Green too! Thus we have a 21st century build that honours the original 1907 development. The level of detail is such that this modern building looks as if it was built in 1907!
It must be mentioned the main 1907 station entrance was where not those other buildings now exist. It was in Brompton Road roughly adjacent to where the new one (opened October 2022) now stands. That building was knocked down sometime after its closure. The existing Leslie Green building was the rear entrance in Basil Street so really the original was quite a large one with two main entrances. The upgrade meant having to shoehorn an accessible station somewhere in between where the two original entrances had once stood and as close to the original lift shafts as possible. And this is why there’s a new entrance in Hooper’s Court.
The former route from the now closed Sloane Street entrance. This constitutes part of the new entrance from Brompton Road that opened in October 2022. The ticket hall is behind the breeze block wall. Twitter.
The Hooper’s Court lifts have been complete for a good while – well over a year since they were finished! They are fully operational as are other aspects of the new (old) station such as roundels and entrance signs. However further work was necessary to incorporate additional infrastructure items that were required – and then it was discovered there were power supply issues – meaning further delays were the order of the day – and it did look as if the Hooper’s Court entrance would never open!
The new development surrounding both the new Brompton Road and Hooper’s Court entrances required very deep piling and with both current and disused tube tunnels directly beneath, a TfL engineer had to be on site all the time work was underway with piles being driven as little as 1cm away from TfL infrastructure. There was a lot of hassle too in reusing the emergency stairs as these were required for the new station entrance. No emergency stairs meant no new station entrance or lifts! Even though the original emergency staircase shaft was reused, previous developments had seen the top of this shaft truncated thus a new route had to be designed from the top of where the existing shaft ended up to the surface. The new exit is quite inconspicuous and only those in the know are aware of its location.
The lift shafts being extended upwards from the old existing shafts in readiness for a new role in connection with the accessible Hooper’s Court entrance. Note the various tools at left that helped the construction workers build this new lift shaft! Linkedin.
What can be realised form this was the extent of the 1907 station prior to the upgrade work was deep below ground where everything was intact including the bottom of the lift shafts, the linking corridors and former staircases. Everything above that had been truncated because of the many sub basements that were built for the properties above from the post war years onward. Thus the lift shafts had to be rebuilt from a point where the old cast iron shafts had been cut, in order to reach the surface. No-one had any expectation the disused parts of the station would ever need to be brought back into use!
The new development above the tube station was problematic because of the shallow foundations. For example drilling for the new foundations was necessary just above the escalator tunnel just below this point. The closest any drilling got to TfL’s tunnels was mere centimetres away! A TfL surveyor had to be on site to see that things went to plan and ensure no part of the tube station was compromised. The site pictured is now the Apple store’s basement. Twitter.