Royal Insurance Building

GRIMSBY

TA2609SE VICTORIA STREET WEST 699-1/21/78 (North side) No.43 Royal Insurance Building

GV II

Shop and offices. 1904 by HC Scaping of Grimsby; JH Thompson, builder, for the Royal Insurance Company. Later C20 alterations to shop windows. Red brick with buff terracotta dressings and marble plinth. Welsh slate roof. Edwardian Freestyle. EXTERIOR: 3 storeys. Occupies corner site, with single bay to Victoria Street, 4 bays to Brewery Street. High plinth with incised blockwork and moulded string course. Channelled rustication to ground floor. Round-arched entrance in canted corner has C20 door and boarded fanlight in architrave with keystone and side brackets supporting a carved corbelled base to an octagonal angle turret which rises through second and third storeys. Ground floor has plain shop window to right (Victoria Street) with C20 glazing in original opening. Brewery Street front to left has similar windows and a doorway entrance to the far left, all beneath deep lintels with hoodmoulds. First floor band. Angle turret has 3 narrow 2/2 sashes in architraves beneath moulded cornice and frieze with ornate relief panels. Bay to right (Victoria Street) has 2/2:6/6:2/2 tripartite sash in a raised surround with apron panel and rusticated Ionic pilasters beneath a pedimented panel, the latter forming an apron to a pair of 6/6 second-floor sashes in keyed architraves. Brewery Street front has a rectangular first-floor oriel to left of centre with a similar pilastered tripartite window, the panel above forming the parapet to a second-floor balcony with a pair of second-floor sashes above. Flanking this are 3 6/6 first-floor sashes in similar Ionic pilastered and pedimented surrounds. Second-floor sashes in keyed architraves. All second-floor windows linked by sill string course and 3 flush bands. Dentilled cornice. Turret has slit lights to second floor, octagonal upper stage with string course carrying small Ionic pilasters, moulded cornice and dome with ball finial. Flanking bays have coped gables with central round-headed niches; plain coped parapet to 3 left bays. INTERIOR: not inspected. Principally included for its external quality and contribution

towards a distinguished Edwardian commercial street. (The Buildings of England: Pevsner N, Harris J, and Antram N: Lincolnshire: London: 1989-: 341; Grimsby - Action for Conservation: Grimsby Borough Planning Department: List of buildings of local architectural or historical interest: Grimsby Borough Council: 1972-: NO.15; Grimsby Planning Department: Central Conservation Area: Grimsby Borough Council: 1990-: NO.15; Grimsby Borough Council: Top Town Trail: Grimsby: 1989-: NO.16).

Listing NGR: TA2686409369