78-94, FOREGATE STREET (See details for further address information)

This is a cooperative department store built between 1904 and 1905 by Douglas and Minshull for the Chester Cooperative Society. It was extended in 1914 and later converted in the 1980s into a series of shops. The building is constructed of stone-dressed brick and designed in a Baroque style.

The main facade, facing Foregate Street, has nine bays, with a further three bays facing Love Street to the right. The ground floor features Roman Doric bay columns in cream stone with altered shop fronts and a blank fascia. The first floor has broad display windows with stained patterned leaded glazing above a transom; narrower windows have sashes and inserted hoppers, all set within stone surrounds. A stone frieze and cornice sits atop corbels. The corner of the building has a segmental-arched, three-light window with 7;16;7 panes to each face, situated above eaves level and sheltered by a lead-roofed cupola featuring a small-paned lantern, a domed roof, and a tall finial. There are five quasi-Palladian timber dormers with 6;6;20;6;6-pane windows, as well as stone-dressed dormer casements to both Foregate Street and Love Street.

The three left bays on Foregate Street, dating from the 1914 extension, have flat roofs. Two ridge chimneys are present, one topped with a stone cap.

Notably, the design departed from John Douglas’s usual Vernacular Revival style and initially provoked disapproval from the City Council Improvement Committee, a compromise being the inclusion of partial leaded glazing.