Chaucer Buildings

Chaucer Buildings comprise shops, offices, and a Freemasons Hall, dating to around 1869 and likely designed by Gibson Kyle. The building is constructed of sandstone ashlar with a Welsh slate roof and stone gable coping. It is built in the Venetian Gothic style and stands three storeys high with attics, arranged over nine bays. A central entrance has been renewed, featuring an overlight set beneath a shouldered lintel supported on shafts with stiff-leaf capitals, and is accompanied by a bracketed cast iron balcony above. The ground floor includes 20th-century shops and a cornice. The first floor is arcaded with paired round-headed windows, except for the central window, which has three lights. The top floor has a gable over three bays to the left, featuring tall, paired two-light windows beneath a roundel with carved ornament. A crocketed gable moulding sits on curved kneelers, topped with a clove finial. The bays to the right feature nook shafts supporting alternately cusped and segmental-headed windows, with the window over the entrance projecting slightly. A corbel table above these bays supports a balustrade and gabled dormers in alternate bays; moulded kneelers and clove finials adorn these features. Ashlar chimneys are present.