Bonding Warehouse And Attached Walls, Railings And Gate Piers

Bonding Warehouse and Attached Walls, Railings and Gate Piers, Skeldergate, York

This warehouse and its bounding yard enclosure date from 1875 and were designed by George Styan, City of York Surveyor. The complex comprises a principal warehouse building with attached yard walls, railings, and gate piers.

The warehouse is constructed of pink mottled brick in Flemish bond with polychrome brick dressings. The ashlar plinth is banded in blue brick and forms a river front revetment. The roofs are covered in Welsh slate. The yard wall is of brick with ashlar coping and cast-iron railings. The gate piers are of ashlar.

The river front presents a 3-storey 7-bay elevation flanked by paired 2-storey 3-bay fronts to the left. The 3-storey range features a centre bay between giant pilasters with a 20th-century glazed door on the ground floor and original lifting doors on the upper floors. The ground and first floor windows in the flanking bays are segment-headed with moulded brick architraves and ashlar sills, set beneath arches of moulded brick with ashlar inserts. The glazing incorporates small panes with central top-hung opening panels. The first floor windows are recessed over shaped panels of contrasting brick. The second floor windows are round-arched with radial glazing, set above a sill band. A moulded eaves string course sits beneath a frieze of shallow shaped panels of contrasting brick and an ashlar eaves band. A low parapet rises over the centre bay as a segmental pedimented gable between panelled piers flanked by volutes, with urn finials to the piers and pediment. A carved panel within the gable depicts the arms of the City of York. The paired 2-storey fronts have 20th-century glazed doors on the ground floor and original lifting doors on the second floor, with fenestration details repeating those of the 3-storey front. Above the junction of the fronts, the roof parapet is stepped up to form a plinth surmounted by ball and pedestal finials.

The left return is 2 storeys and 5 bays, with the outer bays convex on plan. The centre bay, between giant pilasters, has a blind window on each floor and an arcaded eaves corbel table of ashlar and polychrome brick. The flanking bays have fenestration repeating that on the river front, while the end bays have blind windows. The eaves frieze, cornice, and parapet continue from the river front, with a curved gable over the centre bay inscribed "BONDING WAREHOUSE / AD 1875".

The street front is a 3-storey 6-bay range with a 1-storey pent bay at the left end, set back from paired 2-storey 3-bay wings to the right. The left range has tiered lifting doors in the left of the centre bay and segment-arched double board doors in the pent bay. Ground floor windows are segment-arched with ashlar sills and a sill band. First floor windows are segment-arched with ashlar sills, recessed over shaped panels of contrasting brick and a raised first floor band. Second floor windows are round-arched with radial glazing, set beneath keyed hoods on corbel stops, with a raised sill band and narrow impost band. A panelled eaves frieze sits beneath a flat cornice of ashlar and a plain parapet. The paired wings have wide segment-arched doorways in their centre bays, the left one retaining original sliding doors and the right one containing double board doors set in a brick screen. Blind segment-arched windows flank the doorways, set above a raised sill band which rises over the doors to form door arches. The first floor window detailing repeats that of the 3-storey range; the centre windows are blind and have half-hipped canopies on console brackets. The parapet features a plinth between volutes with ball and pedestal finials at the junction.

The interior retains a full-height staircase with stone steps and cast-iron banisters and handrail in the 3-storey part. The lower floors are brick-vaulted on cast-iron columns for fire resistance. The 3-storey part is roofed on 5 massive queen-post trusses; the 2-storey part is roofed on 4 king-post trusses.

The subsidiary features comprise a low yard wall with chamfered coping, raked up at the right end with flat coping, and diagonally set pointed railings. The gate piers are chamfered with bar stops, square on plan, and have rounded cross-pedimented caps.