Dryden Street, formerly Dirty Lane, was laid out in the late 17th century and rebuilt in the 19th century. It is part of the Long Acre Estate belonging to the Mercers’ Company and was re-developed following the widening of Drury Lane in 1835, itself caused by the opening of Waterloo Bridge.
The adjoining stretch of Drury Lane was reconstructed with symmetrical classical elevations in the spirit of Nash’s Metropolitan Improvements to the west. The hinterland, including Dryden Street, was rebuilt in the same materials and proportions, but using simpler language suited to its subsidiary character. It was rebuilt as a shopping street with integral shopfronts on the ground floor, several part-surviving on the north side of the street, with residential above. It perpetuates the more domestic nature of the Mercers’ Estate before its large-scale late-Victorian industrialisation and commercial redevelopment , though there are also, on the south side, good Victorian warehouses.
