The Arcade, Dewsbury

The Arcade is a shopping arcade built in 1899 to designs by Albert Holmes Kirk of the architectural firm John Kirk & Sons. It is executed in a restrained Renaissance style.

Materials and Construction

The building is constructed of ashlar, coursed sandstone, and red brick, with roofs covered in sandstone-slate and Welsh slate. The arcade itself has a glazed cast-iron roof.

Plan and Layout

The Arcade is approximately 62 metres long, running north-south between Corporation Street (at the north end) and Market Place (at the south end). The arcade narrows slightly towards its southern end. It has a linear plan with shop units arranged along the east and west sides, and larger shops positioned at the north and south entrances. Earlier 19th-century buildings are attached to the flanking sides at the southern end, whilst late 19th-century buildings adjoin at the northern end.

Exterior

Corporation Street (North) Entrance

The north entrance block presents an ashlar front elevation of three storeys plus attic, arranged in three bays. The outer bays are gabled, and moulded stringcourses run between floor levels, including one that incorporates the sills of the second-floor windows.

At ground and first-floor level, a large one-and-a-half-storey keyed round-arched opening forms the entrance to the arcade. The arch is corbelled and above it is carved relief lettering reading 'THE ARCADE', set between stringcourses that incorporate a carved scrolled and floriated shell motif. Flanking this entrance are two shopfronts with pedimented and corbelled pilasters, deep signage fascias (partly concealed by modern shop signage), and modern glazing and entrance doorways.

At second-floor level above the arcade opening are paired cross windows set within a shared surround with a raised head incorporating relief numerals showing the date '1899'. The two outer bays are symmetrical and project slightly forward. Each has an eight-light mullioned and transomed canted oriel window at first-floor level and a six-light mullioned and transomed window at second-floor level with a carved frieze above.

At the top of the elevation runs an eaves cornice. Each outer bay is topped by a Dutch gable featuring carved scrolled decoration, a segmental pediment, ball finials, and a tall two-light mullioned window containing plate-glass sashes.

The northern entrance block has a hipped roof behind the gabled bays, covered in Welsh slate, with tall chimneystacks on the east and west hips. The rear elevation, which rises above the arcade roof, is in red brick and has paired blocked-up windows to each bay on the first and second floors.

Market Place (South) Entrance

The southern entrance block is also of three storeys plus attic and is similarly styled to the north entrance, though slightly narrower with some stylistic differences. The south elevation is constructed of ashlar and arranged in three bays with gabled outer bays. The Dutch gables here differ from those at the north, having triangular pediments and carved volutes.

The ground floor has later shopfronts flanking the central round-arched entrance opening, which, like the north entrance, has relief lettering above reading 'THE ARCADE'. Here the carved decoration above is more ornate, and at second-floor level is a single cross window.

The outer bays' upper windows match the style of those at the north end (the right bay contains multipaned leaded glazing with stained-glass Art Nouveau motifs), but on the south side each gable has a cross window. The southern entrance block has a pitched roof covered in sandstone-slate with a truncated ridge stack at the western end.

The rear elevation is constructed of coursed sandstone with windows of varying sizes (mostly containing sashes) on the first and second floors. These include one shortened window, one containing earlier multipaned sashes, and at least one with an exposed sash box.

The Arcade Itself

The main body of the arcade running between the entrance blocks has a glazed roof flanked on the east and west sides by two-storey shop ranges. These have pitched roofs with hips at the northern end where they meet the Corporation Street block. Some roofs incorporate later inserted glazed skylights.

Interior

Internally, the arcade consists of a double-height central walkway with a sandstone-flag floor and shops to each side. Due to changing ground levels, the floor inclines slightly from south to north.

The arcade roof is glazed and supported by cast-iron round-arched frames with floriated and foliated pierced decoration. These are carried on carved corbels and feature pendant lantern lights. Coffered ceilings exist in the sections of arcade passing through the entrance blocks, along with large first-floor shop windows on the east and west sides.

Shopfronts

The arcade's timber shopfronts are separated by pilasters matching those on the external north entrance block, and all have sandstone stallrisers. Each shopfront has a recessed doorway on the northern side (some retaining their original geometric-patterned coloured tiled floors) with a glazed door, pediment over the door, and panelled ceiling above. The shopfront windows incorporate slender mullions and transoms in the upper part forming a row of upper lights. On the north side of each doorway is a glazed display case.

At the top of each shopfront is a signage fascia, and above each pilaster is a later cast-iron bracket with a modern oval-shaped hanging sign. At first-floor level above the shopfronts are alternating tripartite windows and canted oriel windows, all containing sashes including two-over-two sashes in the centre lights. The tripartite windows have carved aprons, and the oriel windows each have a later panelled planter attached below.

Access and Internal Features

The shop units are interspersed with a number of open doorways (one with a split door) providing access to narrow part-stone, part-timber stair flights leading to first-floor rooms. One doorway on the eastern side has been glazed in and the stair replaced in timber, with a doorway knocked through into the neighbouring shop unit on the south side.

Some shop units have additional timber stairs to the first floor (some appear original, others are later insertions), and some have openings and walls knocked through into neighbouring units. The units have concrete floors at ground-floor level and timber floorboard floors above. Walls are exposed brick in places, but some lath and plaster wall partitions and ceilings remain. Moulded door and window architraves and skirtings survive, along with some three- and four-panel doors mainly of late 19th-century date.

One unit on the eastern side has a first-floor trapdoor with a hoist winch beam above. Another unit has a modern steel RSJ lintel above one of the oriel windows.

Entrance Block Interiors

The larger shop units contained within the entrance blocks at the north and south ends of the arcade have generally been modernised.

The shop unit in the north-east corner has later inserted openings in its eastern wall on the upper floors which have since been blocked up. The second-floor space, which spans over the north arcade entrance, has been opened up. Early to mid-20th-century veneer panelling and an in-built cast-iron radiator line an internal stair. An enclosed attic stair accesses the roof space, which has queen post roof trusses and a blocked-up passageway that originally connected into the north-west unit's attic. The north-west shop unit has parquet flooring at ground-floor level and a later stair.

The ground-floor interior of the south-east unit fronting onto Market Place was not inspected, but is understood to have been modernised and now forms part of a larger unit shared with the neighbouring property at 27 Market Place.

The upper floors of the south entrance block retain four-panel and plank and batten doors, substantial chimneybreasts, some sections of moulded cornicing, and some cast-iron fireplaces and built-in cupboards. There are multiple stair flights of varying date, including a stair on the eastern side with a sinuous balustrade interrupted by a later partition wall (the lower flight has been replaced), and a stair on the western side with mostly missing balusters.

There are some wide floorboards at the rear of the block, a large internal multipaned window at second-floor level, and what appears to have been a rear loading door converted into a shorter window when the arcade was built. The attic contains two visible earlier timbers behind a partition, suggesting that an earlier building was altered. The remaining roof timbers appear to be late 19th-century in date.