Plans to turn the vast War Office on London’s Whitehall into a £1 billion five-star hotel and 88 apartments complex by 2020 have been met with opposition from more than 30 objectors who say the plans to alter it will “mutilate” the Grade II listed “masterpiece of Edwardian architecture” The plans include the adding of three additional floors.

The building comprises 580,000 square feet of space, with two miles of corridors linking 1,100 rooms and was sold by the Ministry of Defence last year for £350 million to the Hinduja Group, a huge London-based Indian conglomerate employing 72,000 people, and Spanish construction group OHL which operates in 30 countries.