Bands Warehouse

The Bands Warehouse is a warehouse dating to circa 1890, with minor alterations in the late 20th century. It is constructed of smooth red brick with terracotta detailing, coped gables, and a Welsh slate roof. The building has a narrow street frontage extending into a deep plot, with two street elevations.

The Vernon Street frontage is four stories above a basement and features two gables—one narrow above a recessed loading bay to the left, and one wide with four windows set between narrow corner pilasters. The ground floor has a wide, mullioned workshop or shop window with a small-paned segmental arch and an infilled basement light with a wide arched head. A doorway to the right has a decorative terracotta doorcase, double three-panel doors, and a three-light overlight. The first and second floors each have four sash windows with glazing bars in the upper lights. Flat brick heads, continuous drip moulds, and cill bands are present above the window openings. The upper storey has two sashes flanked and separated by short pilasters rising to the gable apex, with terracotta copings. A narrow hoist bay has a semi-circular arched head below a coped gablet with a round window at the apex, set upon a moulded band above the arch head. Loading doorways are set within a full-height arch-headed recess, with metal landing beams and plate doors. Metal protector plates are at the corners of the ground-floor openings. The rear elevation, fronting Hockenhall Alley, has white glazed brick facings to a single wide gabled frontage, with five windows to the upper floor and three shallow arch-headed openings to the ground floor, as well as a raised doorway to the right. The north side wall has various windows to the second bay, which also features glazed brick facings for a former light well.

Inside, the original hydraulic hoist mechanism remains at attic level. The roof features exposed and painted scissor-braced, asymmetrical trusses with double collars and bolted joints. Joisted floors are supported by steel beams at all levels. An enclosed stair well contains a timber stair with diagonally-crossed balusters and acorn finials to the newel posts. Contemporary half-glazed office partitions are on the ground floor, along with a blocked hearth and surround. Storage floors have unboarded margins to allow air circulation.

The warehouse is believed to have been used for the storage and ripening or drying of bananas and coffee and was formerly linked to an 18th-century house on Dale Street, thought to have been the dwelling of Mr Bands, a merchant and plantation owner. It is a little-altered example of a Liverpool goods warehouse, complete with its hydraulically-powered hoist mechanism, architecturally distinctive and located in the commercial heart of the city.