40-48, BELVOIR STREET, 1, ALBION STREET

Details

LEICESTER

718/0/10231 ALBION STREET 09-FEB-07 1 BELVOIR STREET 40-48 (Formerly listed as: BELVOIR STREET 42-48)

GV II Warehouses and shops, part at present converted to bar/club. 1886-7. By James Tait of Leicester for Reuben Barrow.

MATERIALS Red brick with moulded brick and terracotta ornamental dressings. Interior yard walls faced with white tiles. Parapeted slate roofs.

EXTERIOR Wrenaissance or Neo-Baroque style with fine sash windows with glazing bars and blown glass, elaborate terracotta and brick dressings, tall giant pilasters through first and second floors continuing through the attic storey to a parapet surmounted with ornamental pedestals. Fronts to Belvoir St. and Albion St. with curving corner. Four storeys and cellar. Front to Belvoir St. is a symmetrical range above the ground floor of eight 6/9 sashes to first and second floors, the central six grouped in pairs with three Diocletian windows over the pairs on the third floor with oval windows either side. Ground floor has shop fronts and, to far right, a double panelled door with overlight, all within a banded stone and brick doorcase. The shop fronts have granite pilasters between and appear mainly original to centre and right (Max) and may retain original elements behind C20 fascia to left (Young's). To left is the curved corner of a single window width which is similar and has curved windows. To left of this is the Albion St. front which is again symmetrical above ground floor and similar to the Belvoir St. front but the rhythm is single window: pair of windows with Diocletian over: single window: then a central tripartite sash with smaller window in Diocletian frame over: then single: pair, and single. On the ground floor to right is the continuation of the shop front again retaining granite pilasters, then a wide carriage gateway with brick and stone banded arch with smaller pedestrian entrances either side. The gateway has original double panelled ornamental gates and the entrances have double panelled doors and stone doorcases with circular windows over, the elaborately carved keystones have the Barrow monogram on the left and the date 1887 on the right. To the left is a wide three-light window and a single window to far left, as appearing in the original plans. Cellar windows under have segmental arches.

The interior yard has tall multi-paned metal-framed windows and the walls are white-tiled. The tall chimney was removed many years ago and the fire escapes extended but otherwise the yard remains little altered.

INTERIOR The warehouse interior of the part to the right of the gateway in Albion St. and facing Belvoir St. is unaltered and has iron columns supporting boxed beams and matchboarded ceilings. Stairs have balustrades with stick balusters following the plans. The shop interiors are C20. Interior of No.1 Albion St. not inspected but reported by owner as much altered although beams remain.

HISTORY This purpose-built commercial building with warehousing and shops is by James Tait for Reuben Barrow and is of 1886-7.

REASONS FOR DESIGNATION DECISION: Nos. 40-48 Belvoir Street and No. 1 Albion Street is designated at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

*This building is a comparatively early example of the Wrenaissance or Neo-Baroque, which became much more prevalent in the Edwardian period. It is a carefully designed and finely detailed essay in the Wrenaissance style with very fine terracotta panels and glazing-bar sashes with elegant astragals and blown glass harking back to the C18.

* The whole design is that of a Continental city palace with grand entrance to Albion Street and shops on the ground floor with piano nobile above. Details on the top floor recall Wren's work at Hampton Court and other details that of later Baroque architects elsewhere.

*The building also forms part of a significant group of historic buildings in this part of Leicester.

SOURCES: The original plans for the buildings survive, belonging to Sawday Associates, Architects. The Builder, June 5, 1897, line drawing of upper part of the Belvoir St. front. Pevsner and Williamson, Buildings of England: Leicestershire and Rutland.

SK5885504198

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:

494224

Legacy System:

LBS

Sources

Books and journals
Pevsner, N, Williamson, E, The Buildings of England: Leicestershire and Rutland, (1984)
The Builder in June 5, (1897)

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