Newton Buildings

Newton Buildings is a hat manufacturers' premises built around 1900, with some alterations. The building features an iron frame and concrete floors, clad in ashlar and red brick with buff terracotta dressings, topped by a slate roof. It has a trapezoidal plan and is located on an end-of-block site parallel to Hilton Street. The design is in a free baroque style and comprises a basement and four storeys, plus a full attic storey and a mansard attic.

The structure is notable for its three-storey giant arcades above the ground floor, with two bays facing Newton Street, five bays on Hilton Street, and three bays on Port Street, all adorned with cornices over the ground and third floors. The facade on Newton Street features a round-headed doorway to the right, framed by an architrave with two columns and a large segmental pediment. The ground floor on all three sides has wide rectangular windows with keyed lintels. The arcaded upper floors display wide round-headed arches with quoined surrounds and keystones, most filled with original glazed screens that have wooden frames and metal glazing bars, creating panes of varied sizes. The windows on the first and second floors include floating segmental pediments, while the second and fourth bays on Hilton Street feature two-storey canted oriels decorated with swags.

The attic storey has coupled windows, except for the Newton Street side, which has a large segmental open-pedimented dormer with a round-headed window. The mansard roof on Hilton Street contains dormers with segmental pediments. The interior is said to have segmental barrel-vaulted construction.