The Talbot Hotel

The Talbot Hotel is a large corner building located at the junction of Bank Street, Kirkgate, and Piece Hall Yard, built in 1878 by architects Andrews and Pepper. It features Italianate architectural details, particularly on the top floor. The building is faced with ashlar and stands four tall storeys high, with rounded corners at Kirkgate and Piece Hall Yard.

The main facades have six windows, with one window at each curved corner. A cornice runs over the ground floor shop fronts, serving as a sill course for the first-floor windows. These first-floor windows are round-headed and flanked by panelled strips, with carved console brackets supporting broken entablatures above. The second-floor windows are segmental arched, also featuring similar carved console brackets and broken entablatures, topped with prominent solid pediments adorned with incised ornament.

The console brackets are set on a moulded string course that supports paired pilasters, which are interrupted by the pediments, rising to a projecting bracketed eaves cornice. Incised strings run across the pilasters at the second-floor pediment level and the third-floor sill level, with the pilasters framing the third-floor windows, creating a pilastrade effect. These third-floor windows are divided into two lights, with a central rosette above the transom.

The main frieze features roundels above the pilaster caps and a projecting moulded eaves cornice. The corners of the building have scroll-supported paired chimneys, which are corniced and linked by sections of balustrade. Although modern shop fronts have been added beneath the ground floor entablature, the original hotel entrances remain intact on both fronts. These entrances consist of banded panelled pilaster doorways topped with large console brackets and cornice hoods that support pilaster casts of a Talbot Hound. The return front to Piece Hall Yard showcases a giant pilastrade through the second and third floors, making this an important corner site.