Details
ISLINGTON
TQ3285SE NEWINGTON GREEN
635-1/40/650 (West side)
20/09/54 Nos.52-55 (Consecutive)
GV I
Terraced houses. Dated 1658 in a panel above the central
pilaster; later alterations. Possibly built by Thomas Pidcock.
No 55 restored c.1983-4 by the Greater London Council, nos
53-4 c.1987-8 by English Heritage. Red brick laid in English
bond, roof of slate to no 52, the rest of tiles. Four and five
storeys, two windows each. Unusual plan, each house having a
central dog-leg staircase, between chimneybreasts. Ground
floor has central round arch to passage to rear, C19 pilasters
with bracketed fascia stops, and C20 shop fronts between.
First and second floor have flat-arched windows between a
giant order of Doric pilasters with entablature; the windows
are in frames set almost flush with the wall at these levels,
those to nos 53-55 having 6/6 sashes of original design, all
or most presumably replacements; there is a round arch over
each of the first-floor windows, slightly projecting, with a
square panel recessed in the tympanum; no 52 has lost its
cornice and has a flat-arched window in the rebuit gable; it
also has, in the light-well, a flat-arched, two-light window
with ovolo mullion; no 53 is rebuilt from the entablature
upwards with flat-arched windows set under a slightly
projecting segmental arch, brick coping to gable; no 54 has an
additional third floor recently rebuilt with parapet and
dormer over; no 55 rebuilt similar to no 53. Rear elevations
of brown brick with mostly segmental-arched windows, probably
of later date than the front, and much rebuilt.
INTERIOR: s. No 52 has a staircase with turned newels to the
ground and first floors, and square newels to the second and
third, that to the third having a ball finial. Bulbous turned
balusters are visible to the third floor but enclosed below,
as is the dado panelling between ground and second floors. The
first-floor front room is now subdivided, with panelling and a
plaster cornice surviving on the side and west walls; in the
rear room there is panelling on the north wall only, and a
cornice on all but the west wall. The second-floor front room
has only a dado to the front wall.
No 53 has a staircase with square newels having ball finials
and turned pendants, bulbous turned balusters, chamfered rail
and closed string. There are closets either side of some
fireplaces and some original floorboards. The ground-floor
back room has a back door with hooks for door bars, panelling
to the lower part of the wall, and a C18 flat-arched moulded
architrave with keystone to fireplace; late C18 or early C19
grate in first-floor back room; second-floor front room has
flat-arched moulded architrave to fireplace of late C17 date
with early-to-mid-C19 grate, and the back room has a
strap-hinged plank door connecting to no 52.
No 54 has an early C18 staircase with square chamfered newels
with slightly domed tops, column-on-vase balusters, many
recently remade, and closed string. First-floor front room has
panelling to the chimneypiece only. The second-floor front
room has dado panelling; the back room has panelled closets
and part of a wooden cornice.
No 55 has a staircase with square newels having ball finials,
bulbous turned balusters, and closed string from the basement
through its full height. In the first-floor front room
panelling survives in part to the front and side walls; the
back room has an C18 or early C19 cast-iron grate; and the
walls are partly painted in imitation of panelling. The
second-floor back room has a small amount of surviving
panelling. The original roof structure of no 55 survives.
These houses are extremely rare survivals of pre-Restoration
and pre-Great Fire town houses, and are thus one of the most
remarkable groups of seventeenth-century buildings in London.
(Historians' file, English Heritage, London Division).
Listing NGR: TQ3279685351
