1-19, HANDBRIDGE (See details for further address information)

A row of twelve shops with flats above, one cottage at the corner of Handbridge with Queen's Park Road, and four cottages facing Mill Street, built between 1928 and 1932 by Greenwood, the City Engineer, for Chester City Council. The building is constructed of shaped brick designed to resemble red sandstone, with timber framing and plaster panels, and a roof of grey-green and buff slates. It is an example of Late Vernacular Revival architecture.

The composition includes symmetrical ranges of four cottages facing the Dee across Mill Street, a projecting, jettied gabled shop and flat at the corner with Handbridge, ten shops with flats above facing Handbridge, another projecting, jettied gabled shop and flat at the corner with Queen's Park Road, and a further cottage towards Queen's Park Road, all employing the "stone-brick" shop fronts and timber-framed flats. The shop fronts are of oak with half-glazed, Tudor-arched recessed doors, shaped overlights, and paired entrances to the flats, each with a single step, framed and boarded doors on ornate hinges, and Tudor archways constructed of “stone-brick”. The upper storey features four jettied gables, a rail at sill level, close studding, and casement windows with 12-pane lights. The roof steps down to match the street slope, with a plinthed ridge chimney at each step.

The interiors were not inspected. The cottages act as low-key, successful end-points, and the building forms a well-handled composition in a key location adjacent to the Old Dee Bridge. The shops and cottages stand on the site of earlier shops and condemned dwellings, including court-cottages, and are included as an excellent example of inter-war municipal town planning.