Former Staff Block, (Block 9), Princess Royal Community Hospital, Huddersfield

Former Staff Block (Block 9), Princess Royal Community Hospital, Huddersfield

This is a former maternity hospital staff block, originally built as a vicarage in 1842 and designed in the Tudor-Gothic style by the renowned architect James Piggot Pritchett (1789–1868). The building has undergone alterations in the 20th and 21st centuries.

The structure is built from ashlar block with ashlar detailing and dressings. It has hipped slate roofs and pitched gable roofs finished with terracotta ridge tiles.

The building is rectangular in plan, two storeys high and raised on a plinth. It features a slightly projecting crenelated parapet that partially obscures the hipped roofs, which have outwardly projecting pitched gables on three elevations. The hipped roofs enclose a rectangular central well with lower inner hipped ends and a large central skylight that lights the main stairs below. The northern roof has two chimney stacks rising above both slopes, each with moulded and faceted ashlar chimneys with splayed caps. A truncated chimney stack is situated in the inner slope of the southern roof.

The main east elevation has three bays. The central entrance bay projects slightly and breaks forward from the wall line, featuring a gable with a hooded finial and inclined ashlar coping. The ground floor has a half-glazed frosted glass panelled front door set within a moulded ashlar door surround, approached by four ashlar steps. The door has a four-centred arched glazed fanlight decorated as a portcullis with a central quatrefoil boss, flanked by two similar shaped windows with cast-iron tracery grilles. The moulded surrounds rise to form a blind tricuspid panel beneath a hoodmould, topped by a plain parapet bearing a shield dated 1842. Above on the first floor is a bipartite stone mullioned sash set in a moulded stone lancet window, flanked by arrow loops. The flanking bays on either side have bipartite stone mullioned four-light sash windows with moulded surrounds and hoodmoulds beneath a slightly projecting crenelated parapet. The central bay has a slightly projecting ground-floor tracery panel.

The three-bay south elevation is similar in appearance to the main elevation but the central bay is wider. The first floor has a central bipartite stone mullioned four-light sash window with a hoodmould, flanked by similar narrow two-light sashes, set beneath a more depressed gable pierced by a diamond-shaped moulded quatrefoil cusped vent. The central ground-floor doorway is flanked by narrow two-light sashes and has been enclosed by an external link corridor, which is not included in the listing.

The west elevation is similar to the main elevation, but the central bay does not project and displays a gable with a plain ashlar shield. The gable apex is crowned by a projecting moulded and faceted ashlar chimney with a splayed cap. The elevation has a mixture of two, four, and six light windows with moulded surrounds and hoods.

Apart from a short length of wall at the eastern corner, the original north elevation is hidden by later extensions, although the crenelated parapet remains exposed for its full length. The attached former nurses' accommodation extensions and single-storey stores extension are not included in the listing.

Internally, the main entrance on the east elevation leads through a splayed doorway into a narrow rectangular hallway with encaustic tiles, dado rails, picture rails, and a coved ceiling. Doorways with Gothic-styled moulded architraves decorated with quatrefoils at the corners lead to the former dining room, a former study, and the central stair hall. The rectangular stair hall occupies the central space, with original Gothic panelled doors and secondary plain four-panelled doors giving access to the principal ground- and first-floor rooms in the east and side ranges. The cantilevered main well staircase rises in two flights against the north wall, featuring cast-iron Gothic tracery balusters made by the Walker Foundry of Walmgate, York, carved timber Gothic panelled newel posts with pyramidal caps, and a moulded handrail. It rises to a cantilevered first-floor landing on two sides beneath a central skylight in a deeply coved and moulded ceiling. A doorway at the base of the stairs leads into the former service range served by a corridor with four-centred ceiling arches and a service stair. A similar doorway on the first floor leads to the service range and service stairs with plain timber balusters.

Although most rooms retain their chimney breasts, no fireplaces survive. However, Gothic arched alcoves, panelled doors, and some ceiling cornices remain.

The attached nurses' accommodation, single-storey stores block, and linking corridors, dating to 1928 and 1939, are not of special architectural or historic interest and are excluded from the listing.