Verdin Building

The Verdin Building, also known as Verdin Comprehensive School, is a school building dated 1895. It is constructed of red Flemish bond brick with ashlar dressings and has a plain tile roof, designed in the Netherlandish Renaissance style. The building stands two storeys high with an attic.

The entrance front features a central section with three wide bays that have a shaped gable above and project forward, flanked by lower wings on either side. There is a slightly projecting plinth with a chamfered top that runs along the entire building. A string course separates the floors, with another, more subtle string course at the level of the first-floor window sills. The central doorway on the ground floor is now blocked and features a basket arch with terra-cotta voussoirs.

On either side of the central doorway are three-light windows at ground floor level, each with ovolo moulded surrounds. The first floor has similar windows with transoms, all adorned with terra-cotta voussoirs that alternate between dropped and gabled above the central keystones. Above, a central two-light window has vertical strips on either side that extend upward to frame a small three-light attic window, which is detailed with moulding below and a coat of arms above.

The gable is decorated with a series of volutes along the outer edge, featuring terra-cotta coping and winged lions as finials at the lower edges and summit. Flanking the central gabled bays are quarter-octagonal bays, each with two-light windows on the ground floor and three-light windows above, all topped with ogee heads. The extreme right and left wings are slightly recessed, each with basket arched double doorways near the centre and four-light windows with mullions and moulded surrounds at the far ends. There are 20th-century dormer windows above.

At the rear, there is an extensive single-storey wing in the centre, which has three-light windows with moulded terra-cotta surrounds and alternately gabled roofs.