Cabin Lift

A seaside lift tower built in 1930 and known as the Cabin Lift, with associated toilets and upper promenade wall. It was designed by John Charles Robinson, the borough architect of Blackpool.

The lift tower is constructed of brick with faience dressings beneath a copper roof, arranged in a rectangular plan. It is accessed from the upper promenade by a bridge flanked by brick walls extending along the promenade. The building is designed in the Classical revival style, with the main architectural detail concentrated at the top of the tower. This consists of a pyramidal copper roof with a central flagpole, beneath which runs a moulded faience eaves cornice carrying a decorated frieze depicting a festoon around the entire structure. On three sides of the tower are aedicules, with the sea-facing one flanked by decorative faience work.

Double doors beneath a porch on Queens Promenade provide access across the bridge to the tower. Adjacent to these is a former second entrance now blocked by glazed brickwork incorporating the words "CABIN LIFT". Small rectangular windows with moulded faience surrounds appear on three sides of the tower. At artificial cliff level are two blocked doors beneath a stone lintel. The lower promenade entrance has two doors beneath a glazed brick lintel bearing the word "LIFT" above the larger door.

Immediately beneath the upper promenade stands a toilet block with boarded-up doors to the north and south returns. It consists of ten bays with mullion and transom windows with glazing bars and horizontal faience banding.

Internally, the upper promenade access leads directly into a small room containing the lift and a fixed iron ladder providing access to the attic, where electrical equipment and lift mechanism are housed. Access from the left door on the lower promenade leads along a tunnel beneath the artificial cliff to the lift; the right door opens into a storage area. A modern brick wall separates these two areas. Other walls in the lower promenade tunnel are of glazed brick.

The Cabin Lift was constructed in 1930 to move passengers via two lifts between the upper promenade tram stop and the lower promenade walkway, artificial cliffs and former boating pool. The front portion formerly containing a waiting shelter on the upper promenade and extending across the bridge has been demolished at an unspecified date, and access to the south lift has been walled up. The current north lift was installed in 1990, replacing an original lift. Ladies' and Gentlemen's toilets built into the cliff immediately below the upper promenade, formerly accessed by walkways either side of the cabin lift, were refitted in the 1970s and are currently boarded up and inaccessible. Former doors providing access into the lift tower from the artificial cliffs have been bricked up. On the lower promenade, former doors accessing the tunnel running below the artificial cliffs to the lift tower have been removed and the entrance remodelled with modern smaller doors inserted. The tunnel has been subdivided at an unspecified date by a dividing wall along its length; currently only the northern part provides access to the lift.