The neighbourhood surrounding Eaton Square Gardens in a way has two faces: one, the busy transport hub based at Victoria coach station and stretching along Buckingham Palace Road, up to Victoria railway station and down to Chelsea Bridge; and the other, a residential side, which blends into the Eaton Square and Belgravia area and is one of London’s richest neighbourhoods. The rough split between these two areas is Ebury Street, with the coach station to the east.

Victoria coach station, surrounded by office buildings and shops and mainly facing Buckingham Palace Road, hosts numerous intercity buses such as the X90 and Oxford Tube to Oxford, as well as local and tourist buses, such as Golden Tours and the Hop-On Hop-Off buses.

The residential portion comprises of well-built Regency-era and Victorian-era terraces and is interspaced with a few embassies, including the Embassy of Spain and the Embassy of Hungary. A notable feature of the area is Eaton Square Gardens, which stretches for nearly 500 metres and is nearly 100 metres wide, and separates the core of Belgravia from Victoria. A smaller linear garden is also found in Chester Square.

Eaton Square was built in the 1800s, with the first block being laid by Thomas Cubitt in 1827, under the patronage of the Grosvenor family. The area was built as an upper class neighbourhood, though paled in comparison to Mayfair and Belgravia-proper to its west. It hosted numerous important figures even in the lead up to the war, with the Belgian government-in-exile residing there between 1940 and 1944. After the war, much of the surrounding areas were converted into commercial uses, but it remained residential and is today one of the most expensive neighbourhoods in the world.

Neville Chamberlain, Prime Minister from 1937 to 1940, lived on 37 Eaton Square. He is famous for his appeasement policy towards Hitler’s Germany, signing the Munich Agreement, which ceded the Sudetenland of Czechoslovakia, and was PM going into the war. He resigned after the Allies retreated from Norway, in favour of a unity government under Winston Churchill.

Stanley Baldwin, another Prime Minister who preceded Neville Chamberlain, lived just down the road at 93 Eaton Square. He too suffered from the reputation of being one of the ‘Guilty Men’ who tried to appease Adolf Hitler in the lead up to the Second World War; his own reputation was also soiled by the massive unemployment which struck the UK during the Great Depression.

The Eaton Square/Belgravia residential area is one of the most desired in the world, and it comes with its price tag. Disregarding price, however, the area is relatively far from supermarkets and shops, with most being based around the highly-congested Victoria area.

The Belgravia area is largely architecturally stagnant, with small-scale conversions taking place within the confines of preservation. However, towards Buckingham Palace Road the area is in constant flux, with new office buildings emerging and redevelopment planned for Victoria coach station, which covers more than three acres of land. Recently, it was announced that London Victoria station will be receiving a £30 million upgrade, intended to start work on enhancing its capacity and improving its accessibility. More ticket barriers will be placed and the halls expanded to accommodate the increased number of users and passengers the station is now serving. Food halls and outlets will be removed but new outlets will be constructed on platform level elsewhere to compensate.