John Watts Cutlery Works

John Watts Cutlery Works

Cutlery manufactory on Lambert Street, empty at the time of inspection in February 2002. The building dates from the late 18th century, with extensive remodelling and enlargement throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries. It is constructed of red brick with stone dressings, and the street elevation is now completely rendered with bands of raised lettering. The roofs are slated with ridge chimney stacks.

The building has a complex evolved plan, with a long stepped frontage range, parallel extensions to the rear elevations enclosing narrow yards, and an irregular rectangular extension range across the rear of the plot incorporating galleried machine shops with galleries above.

The front elevation presents a stepped frontage of three storeys, formed of five linked units with window bays arranged in the pattern 3:4:5:2:4. The left end range features two and three-light windows with casement frames and two doorways to the ground floor, one of which has been enlarged. The second unit has a deep front roof pitch and four wide first floor windows above a wide full-width sign with raised lettering reading 'JOHN WATTS ESTABLISHED 1765'. Single and double doorways open to the ground floor. The third unit contains five sash windows to the first and upper floors, those to the first floor being two-over-two sashes. Two ground floor windows and a wide vehicle entrance are positioned to the right. The fourth unit has low eaves and a two-window front, with openings diminishing in height in ascending order. Signs made up of raised lettering between floors read 'MANUFACTURERS CUTLERY & OTHER SPECIALITIES' above and 'STA-ERS AND PIERCERS AND METAL WORKERS' below. A double doorway is set to the left, with a single door to the right and a tall three-light casement between them. The fifth unit has five sash windows to each of the upper floors, each with raised letter signage below. The upper sign repeats the company name and date of establishment, whilst the lower sign reads 'SAFETY RAZORS SCISSORS SKATES ETC.' The rear elevations are now built against, with single and storied 19th and 20th century workshops extending along and across the rear yards; some feature glazed north light roof structures.

Internally, the frontage ranges have been modified to provide workshop and office accommodation at first and second floor levels. The left-hand part functions as an open plan workshop with exposed late 18th century roof trusses and purlins, including one truss with a collar and a supplementary collar installed to replace removed tie beams, whose stubs are carried on raking struts. In-situ work benches remain. The right-hand part contains a complete attic buffing workshop with in-situ workbenches and belt-driven polishing wheels. The first floor is organised into office, showroom, cashiers and board room areas, featuring in-situ display cabinets, counters, wall panelling and part-glazed internal screens, together with enquiry and cashiers windows with painted signs. The principal offices retain hearths with moulded surrounds. The machine shops to the rear of the yard include one with a north-light glazed roof structure and an access gallery carried on cast-iron columns, retaining many 20th century machine tools and extensive line shafting for belt drives. The right-hand machine shop has a fully-glazed pitched roof and a gallery workshop carried on cast-iron columns, with continuous gallery benching facing onto a central light well. The ground floor contains two domestic hearths in otherwise modified compartments.

Historically, Lambert Street is shown with built-up frontages on Gosling's 1736 map of Sheffield. The 1850 Ordnance Survey map shows dwelling houses with overbuilt courts to the rear, whilst the 1890 edition shows a large works complex incorporating the earlier dwellings. This is a rare survival in a Sheffield context, reflecting the phase of adaptive re-use of dwellings that is graphically displayed in the Birmingham Jewellery Quarter, representing a highly distinctive metalworking community of international significance.