Warehouse at 12 Effingham Street

Warehouse at 12 Effingham Street

A warehouse dating to around 1884, built with fireproof cast-iron frame construction encased internally in concrete. The exterior is constructed of mellow red brick with red and blue-black brick dressings. The building comprises six storeys plus a basement.

The warehouse is situated on the south side of Effingham Street and has a rectangular plan with a relatively narrow frontage but considerable depth extending far back. It is enclosed on both sides by other warehouses of originally similar date and style, though these have been heavily altered and substantially reduced in height. Napier Street, which originally ran to the rear, has since been built upon and replaced by modern warehousing.

The front elevation facing north towards Effingham Street is arranged in four bays with a raised ground floor. Bays two and four contain two loading bays set within full-height recesses, detailed with blue-black, cut and rubbed brick quoining and red-brick arched heads. Tiered sheet-iron loading doors bearing the names of the O & D Williams and Thomas Brothers iron foundries are still present, along with original protective timber fenders at the base of each loading bay (designed to prevent bales from damaging the building when first lifted) and iron hooks set into the brickwork.

The bay at the far left contains a segmental-arched entrance to the ground floor, which accesses the warehouse staircase, featuring a studded sheet-iron door within a cast-iron frame. Above this entrance are slender stair windows with cast-iron frames and sheet-iron shutters, red-brick segmental-arched heads, and blue-black, cut and rubbed brick sills. Bay three contains wider, squarer windows of the same style, which light the internal storage areas; the ground-floor window has had its original sill replaced and built up in concrete. At the base of bay three is an additional inserted doorway with a cast-iron frame, concrete lintel and sheet-iron door. At the top of the elevation, aligned with the windows below, is an oculus with a red-brick surround, lighting the jigger loft (the top floor housing the hoist machinery). Above this runs a sandstone cornice and brick parapet stretching across the elevation. The brickwork on the west side elevation has been repaired at the front corner, apparently when the adjacent warehouse was reduced in height. The roof is hidden from view on both sides by a brick parapet (a fireproofing measure to prevent fire spreading between neighbouring buildings) with sandstone copings.

Internally, an enclosed stone staircase set to the front left, within a brick stair compartment, provides access to all floor levels, although access to the upper floors has been blocked up at the first landing. Sheet-iron doors within cast-iron frames lead off to the right at basement and ground-floor levels into large open-plan warehouse spaces. These spaces feature cast-iron floors, ceilings and supporting piers, all encased in concrete; the construction is visible on the ground-floor level where a small section of ceiling is missing, and this plan is believed to remain intact on the upper floors. A doorway to the rear left of the ground floor, which would originally have led into the neighbouring warehouse, has been blocked up. Set alongside the east wall are two kitchenette and office structures, possibly dating to the early-to-mid 20th century, which are not of special architectural or historic interest. It is unknown whether any hoist machinery survives in the jigger loft.