Former Waterproof Clothing Factory

FORMER WATERPROOF CLOTHING FACTORY

A waterproof clothing factory, now partly used as warehouse, built between 1914 and 1916 by architect William Wells of Grimsby for Cosalt Limited (The Great Grimsby Coal, Salt and Tanning Company). The building is constructed in red brick laid in English bond with blue brick dressings and mosaic tile decoration. The front has a green slate roof whilst the rear is roofed in Welsh slate. The structure employs an internal steel frame and is designed in the Scottish Baronial style.

The building is rectangular on plan, comprising a 3-storey section fronting Robinson Street with a 2-storey range to the rear left facing onto Holme Street. The Robinson Street frontage is divided into 1:4:1 bays with projecting corner pavilions containing entrances and staircases. The central section has a stepped plinth and a full-height arcade of round-headed arches of two plain orders, containing recessed windows to each floor. The end bays feature deep hollow-chamfered plinths. The left pavilion has a round-headed doorway with double board door and a fine mosaic tympanum in a deeply-splayed reveal beneath a stepped brick arch of four orders, within a recessed square-headed panel with bands of radiating brick and tile framed by a moulded brick architrave. Single slit-lights flank each side. A similar, smaller entrance occupies the right pavilion, with a double window of two square-headed lights to its left. Both tympana above the doors display Art Nouveau-style patterns in green, grey, white and gold mosaic.

The left and right end bays contain two double windows to the first floor and a shallower tripartite window to the second floor, the latter consisting of a central double window flanked by single side lights. All these windows have glazing bars and moulded chamfered blue brick sills beneath soldier arches. Blue brick diaper-work appears between the first and second storeys. The central bays have 3-light windows to each floor, those to the second floor being round-arched; all feature wooden ogee mullions and transoms with glazing bars and chamfered brick sills. Some ground-floor windows are partly boarded up. Between windows at first-floor and second-floor level are raised moulded brick string courses and mosaic panels (boarded over at the time of survey) with lettering in green on cream mosaic reading "GRIMSBY - WATERPROOF - CLOTHING - FACTORY" and "HEAD - OFFICE - FISH - DOCKS". The eaves are corbelled brick with imitation machicolations. A tall brick-coped parapet to the central section bears a mosaic panel and lettering reading "THE GREAT GRIMSBY COAL, SALT AND TANNING CO. LTD.", obscured by a later name-board.

The corner pavilions have coped parapets and steep gables with blue brick diaper-work and single round-arched slit-lights. Prominent downpipes with decorative rainwater-heads are visible throughout. The pitched roofs are hipped to the rear, with a short lift-shaft pavilion. The right return features diapered brickwork to the second storey and a coped gable to the corner pavilion. The left return has 2-light and 4-light windows and diaper brickwork to the corner pavilion. A 3-storey, 3-bay section adjoins to the left, featuring three cross-windows to the ground floor and three 2-light windows to the upper floors, with a coped parapet. A 2-storey, 7-bay range to the left has recessed full-height panels to each bay with 3-light square-headed windows to the ground floor and recessed 3-light segmental-headed windows to the first floor, all with wooden ogee mullions, transoms and glazing bars. A waggon entrance with deeply-splayed reveal appears to the right, with an inserted entrance to the third bay. A dentilled brick cornice surmounts the recessed panels, with stepped eaves, a low parapet and prominent downpipes. This rear section has a 5-span north-light roof with glazed panels and coped gables featuring oculus windows with glazing bars.

The main entrance-staircase hall in the left pavilion contains an internal porch with a patterned tiled barrel vault and a 2-fold half-glazed inner door with lattice-style glazing bars beneath a radial fanlight. A fine main staircase features a brick arcaded stairwell with round and segmental arches with impost bands, geometric-patterned iron balustrades and a moulded swept handrail. Staircase windows and other windows in the pavilions have chamfered brick mullions set in chamfered segmental-arched brick reveals. A plaque in the entrance hall records the building's erection "during the years (1914, 1915, 1916) of the Great War" and its opening on 29 February 1916, with a list of company directors. The main stores and work-rooms have exposed steel framing.

The Cosalt Company was established in 1873 and became one of the largest concerns of its kind, with branches worldwide. Its name reflected its principal business of supplying coal to fishing boats, salt for fish curing and the tanning of sails and fishing nets. Other Cosalt buildings in Grimsby include the former butchers shop in Fish Dock Road and the Cordage Works off Convamore Road. William Wells, the architect, also designed Brighowgate House on Brighowgate.