Royal Exchange Buildings And Adjoining Castle House

The Royal Exchange Buildings and adjoining Castle House are a development incorporating shops, flats, a veterinary surgery, and a dogs’ home, now primarily shops and flats, designed by John Henry Bryars. The buildings date to 1900, with alterations in the late 20th century. They are constructed of brown glazed brick with ashlar dressings and slate roofs.

The Royal Exchange Buildings, comprising shops and flats, feature moulded sillbands, octagonal corner buttresses, and a mansard roof with seven coped brick stacks along the front wall. The building is four storeys high plus attics, with a 14-window range. Bays are divided by canted pilasters, with crowstep gables and finials to the central and outer bays. The windows are primarily plain sashes, some of which are boarded. The first and second floors each have 14 windows. The third floor has a central gable with a moulded oval window, flanked by four box dormers. The end bays have two windows each. The attic level has five box dormers. The ground floor has seven shopfronts divided by glazed brick pilasters, under a continuous cornice. One shopfront on the left side is largely unaltered, with a segment-headed opening containing a shop window to the left and a recessed door with overlight to the right. The other shopfronts are boarded or reglazed. The right return has a central buttress topped with a finial in a crowstep gable. There are two windows on the upper floors, and on the ground floor, a pair of large, altered openings. The rear elevation has a stair tower to the left, with a steep pitched swept roof and finials, along with access bridges and balconies to each floor. A link building connects to the Royal Exchange Buildings, with three storeys plus attics and a two-window range, featuring two gable stacks. The upper floors have two windows, and above those, two through-eaves dormers with crowstep gables. The ground floor of the link building has a cart entrance with segment-arched double doors.

Castle House, situated to the rear, has a continuous basement with windows aligned with the building and an access road, featuring a cast-iron balustrade and a wrought-iron gateway with an overthrow incorporating Bryars' monogram. The access road connects Lady's Bridge with Blonk Street. Castle House has sillbands, a main cornice, a crenellated coped parapet, and gables; it is three storeys high plus a garret, with a 12-window range. Bays are divided by canted pilasters. The river front has 12 windows on each of the upper floors. The ground floor has four large openings, now blocked, to the access road, with shouldered heads and steel lintels. An angled left corner, above the access road, has two windows on each of the upper floors, and a shouldered opening below. The left return has regular fenestration, including a Venetian window and hoist in the gable.

The interior has not been inspected. The buildings are complementary to the Royal Victoria Buildings on the opposite side of the road and form part of the same development scheme, as evidenced by a deposited plan from 1899.