Minshull House

MANCHESTER

SJ8497NW CHORLTON STREET 698-1/32/66 (North East side) 08/05/90 No.47 Minshull House

GV II

Canal warehouse, in use as a Polytechnic library at the time of listing. Early to mid C19, probably enlarged in later C19, and subsequently altered. Red brick in English garden wall bond (the front rendered), with sandstone dressings, corrugated sheet cladding to jettied upper floors at rear (roof concealed), internal cast-iron and wrought-iron frame. L-plan formed by main range on east-west axis between Chorlton Street at front and former canal basin at rear, with a wing at the south-east corner. Three storeys over a basement, 5x13 bays; symmetrical west front 1:3:1 bays, now covered with scored render; the centre breaks forwards slightly and has rusticated quoins and a very wide elliptical-arched former wagon entrance with rusticated long-and-short surround and raised keystone (now blocked with C20 glazed screen containing doorway), and segmental-headed windows on both floors above, all with raised sills and altered glazing; the outer bays have tall round-headed openings with C20 glazing, and upper windows like those in the centre. The 13-window left return wall has (inter alia) a 3-window portion towards the rear which matches the centre portion of the front and has a similar wagon archway (now blocked, with windows on 2 levels), and to the right of this a narrow loading slot with a pitched canopy breaking the eaves. The rear is distinguished by a full-width cantilevered jetty from the 1st floor upwards overhanging the side of the former basin, and the wall below this has a mooring ring and the remains of a wooden wall-crane. Interior: retains intact framework of cast-iron columns (those at ground floor very thick, with entasis, and vertical fins), a system of struts and tie-rods to the cantilevered upper floors, and timber king-post roof trusses with raked struts.

Listing NGR: SJ8447997885