Alexandra House And Attached Railings

Alexandra House, now flats, was built between 1863 and 1867 and altered in the 20th century. It was originally designed for John Anderson, the Resident Engineer for the Saltburn Improvement Company, and is likely the work of John Ross of Darlington. The building is constructed of painted white firebrick from Pease's West brickworks in County Durham, with sandstone ashlar dressings, and has a covered Welsh slate roof with decorative fishscale detailing and brick chimneys.

The four-storey building, with attics and a basement, is terraced and slightly convex in plan, featuring a seven-window range set in irregular bays. The main entrance, in the fifth bay, has a 20th-century panelled door within a stone surround, with side and overlights. Most windows have renewed glazing in basket-headed stone surrounds, except on the top floor. Canted bay windows extend through the basement and three floors of bays 1, 3, 4, and 7. A round turret projects from the sixth bay, with canted windows on the ground and first floors, and flanking lights on the second floor. The top floor has sash windows with keyed segmental heads in plain stone surrounds. The entrance bay features a tripartite stone mullion and transom window extending through the first and second floors, with carved quatrefoil bands on the transoms, and a Venetian-style top window with shafts and a stopped dripmould. Elaborate cast-iron balconies are present on the ground and first floors of all bays, except the seventh where the ground floor window projects from a stone relieving arch and the first-floor balcony aligns with the window sill instead of projecting. Long brackets support the cornices over the first and second-floor canted bays, and all floors are defined by impost bands. An eaves gutter cornice sits on long brackets, raised to form a half-gable over the entrance bay. The mansard roof has flat-headed dormers and large corniced brick stacks.

The entrance is marked by square, corniced piers at the foot of the steps, topped by an elaborate balustrade supporting an iron handrail. The interior was not inspected.

The building’s original railings consist of arcaded ironwork with spike dogbars in front of the first six bays, and similar railings along a high area wall in front of the seventh bay, curving to meet the gable wall. Built on a site laid out to a 1861 plan by George Dickinson, the hotel, when opened in 1867, contained 100 rooms.