Townhouse Studios

Townhouse Studios stood on Goldhawk Road in Shepherd’s Bush, a plain three-storey building turned into a recording complex in 1978 by Richard Branson for Virgin Records. The site had three studios numbered One, Two and Four, while a fourth space was later added in Battersea after Virgin bought Ramport Studios from The Who. The front of the building carried trompe-l'œil murals by Ken White that disguised its industrial shape. The studios became one of London’s busiest rooms, attracting artists from Elton John and Queen to Coldplay and Oasis. Studio Two’s Stone Room earned a special reputation in the 1980s when producer Hugh Padgham shaped the drums on Phil Collins’ ‘In the Air Tonight’. The control room in Studio One housed a 72-input Helios desk linked to an Alison 64K computer, while Studio Two installed Britain’s first Solid State Logic SL 4000 B console in 1978. Visitors today will find only the entrance arch and a few plaques where the control rooms once stood. The building itself is now part of a luxury apartment block, but the Stone Room’s thick walls still echo the sound of the era. The Helios console was moved to New Jersey and the SSL partnership marked by a commemorative desk in Studio One.