21 Soho Square, London

In 1776, Thomas Hopper bought the hundred year old White House at 21 Soho Square.

Officially it was a hotel, but it became known as the 'Magical Brothel'. Hopper used stage magician techniques to build contraptions in each room to scare and amaze patrons who stayed there.

By 1838, Hopper had long gone and Edmund Crosse and Thomas Blackwell bought the house as offices for their new company making condiments. They ran it from here until 1925.

In 1933, the film unit of the Empire Marketing Board moved into the building, led by Stephen Tallents. He renamed it the GPO Film Unit and produced many now classic documentary and propaganda films. The most well known was Night Mail in 1936 featuring music by Benjamin Britten and poetry by W. H. Auden.

Laurie Lee, author of coming-of-age novel Cider With Rosie worked as a scriptwriter in the unit in 1940.

Today, the building is the offices of Andrew Lloyd Webber's company Really Useful Theatres. They manage six London theatres: London Palladium, Theatre Royal Drury Lane, Adelphi, Her Majesty's, Cambridge and New London.