Head Post Office

WIGAN

SD5805NW WALLGATE 24-1/7/96 (West side) 09/12/98 No.28 Head Post Office

GV II

Post office. Dated 1884 over doorway; slightly altered externally. Pink triassic sandstone ashlar at ground floor, red brick in Flemish bond with sandstone dressings to the upper floors, hipped slate roof. Rectangular plan with C20 extensions to rear. Free Renaissance style combining Italian palazzo and Queen Anne Revival features. EXTERIOR: 3 storeys and attic, 3:1 windows in 2 unequal bays; moulded egg-and-dart cornice to ground floor, sillband to 2nd floor, plain frieze and dentilled cornice, with attic gable over wider 1st bay. The ground floor has a doorway to the left in a fluted pilastered architrave with a raised panel on the frieze inscribed "1884" and a swan-neck pediment with swag; a large elliptical-headed window to the right with similar fluted pilasters and a moulded extrados with keystone; and a 2-light window in the 2nd bay with moulded architrave. Both upper floors have 3 tall windows in the 1st bay and pilastered tripartite windows in the 2nd bay, all with moulded architraves, those at 1st floor sashed without glazing bars plus tilting casement openings in the heads, and those at 2nd floor also sashed, mostly with glazing bars in the upper leaves. The attic gable has an oculus in a voluted stone archivolt, and gable coping with a finial. 3-storeyed rear extension of 1895, by WEV Crompton of Wigan. Faced in glazed brick with terracotta dressings. Enriched ground floor door and window openings and glazing bar sashes to upper two storeys. INTERIOR altered. Forms group with pair of K6 Telephone Kiosks in front (qv), Bees Knees Public House (qv) to the right, No.22 (qv) opposite this, Nos 12-20 (qv) and Nos 6, 8 and 10 (qv) beyond these, collectively having strong group value with Church of All Saints (qv) and War Memorial (qv). Included for group value.

Listing NGR: SD5816405610

This List entry has been amended to add the source for War Memorials Register. This source was not used in the compilation of this List entry but is added here as a guide for further reading, 30 October 2017.