Royal London House

Royal London House is an insurance office built in 1904 by Charles Heathcote. It features an iron frame with sandstone ashlar cladding and a ground floor made of dark brown polished granite, topped with a slate roof. The building has a large rectangular plan situated on an island site and is designed in a Free Baroque style. It stands five storeys tall with an attic and consists of 15 bays, including a 3-bay central section and 2-bay ends that slightly project forward.

To the left, there is a set-back chamfered corner that leads to the Quay Street facade, topped by an octagonal two-stage turret. The ground and first floors are adorned with banded pilasters, each featuring a frieze, while the second and third floors showcase giant segmental-headed arcades with chamfered pilasters and modillioned segmental cornices that include voluted keystones. The prominent modillioned cornice is complemented by vernacular-style triangular gables over the central and end sections, with small segmental dormers positioned between them.

The ground floor has a central doorway framed by a projected pedimented architrave and large modern plate-glass windows. Above the doorway on the first floor is a cross-window with blocked semi-columns and an open-segmental pediment, alongside casements in the other bays. The second floor features casements with triple keystones, while the third floor has round-headed three-light casements. The top floor contains casements set within colonnades that create screens for the windows between the central and end sections. The attic gables are fitted with three-light casements.

The corner to the left includes one-light windows with varying architraves on each floor, a cupola lantern with small round-headed windows between pairs of blocked colonnettes, a stepped modillioned cornice, and a domed roof. The right-hand corner also features a domed cupola. There is a six-bay return end to Quay Street that matches the overall style of the building. The interior has not been inspected.