Grand Arcade

This shopping arcade was built in 1898 to designs by Smith and Tweedale in a Flemish Renaissance style incorporating Art Nouveau decorative details. The building has undergone 20th and 21st century alterations.

Materials and Construction

The arcade is constructed using red granite, wrought-iron boxed girders, terracotta brick, stone and Burmantofts' faience detailing. The roofs are covered with sea-green Westmorland slate tiles and glass. Polished hardwoods feature throughout the interior.

Layout

The arcade was originally built to a rectangular H-plan configuration. It has since been reduced to one main mall of shops and a short arcade leading to Merrion Street. In 1920, half of the northern arcade and the New Briggate frontage were incorporated into a cinema.

Exterior

The building occupies a prominent site adjoining the Grand Theatre, with elevations facing north, east and south. The three shop frontages and glazed entrances to New Briggate and Vicar Lane have cross-gabled pitched roofs. Behind these are east-west aligned pitched roofs which are glazed over the arcades and slated over the shops on either side. The western half of the north arcade now sits beneath one substantial pitched roof. The building is now two storeys in height.

New Briggate Façade

The New Briggate façade has six bays arranged in a symmetrical composition. This comprises three gables of four storeys separated by two glazed semi-circular entrances of two storeys. At the left-hand outer corner stands a two-storey oriel tower.

On the ground floor, polished granite piers flank the three gabled shop fronts and two arcade entrances. Square piers mark the outer corners, whilst circular piers with bracketed capitals frame the arcade entrances. Both entrances are now glazed to the arch heads with entrances beneath.

The upper gabled elevations are built of red brick and stone with buff stone and buff terracotta dressings. Moulded stone string bands run across the elevation. The single-bay entrances have Burmantofts faience facings.

The wider central gable end contains a pair of two-storey, four-light canted oriel windows with enriched Renaissance style lintel bands to both floors. The first-floor oriel windows have toplights and the second-floor windows have a central moulded baluster mullion. The gable head contains a pair of floral bracketed two-light mullion windows with terracotta quoined jambs and enriched triangular pediments. The apex has a central knapped diamond mullion and a scrolled and enriched faience panel dated 1897, with a moulded gable finial.

The outer gables have five-light first-floor oriel windows and square-headed four-light second-floor windows. Above these are twin niches with knapped diamond mullions extending below and above to form shaped gable heads with moulded finials at the apex.

Each of the two arcade entrances has faience keystones to the arches with terracotta mouldings and spandrels ornamented with pea-green glazed tile borders and foliated decoration. Each features a stylised, scrolled and foliated frieze bearing the superscribed letters 'THE GRAND ARCADE'. Above this is an arcade of enriched tapered faience columns with eight square-headed lights, and curved faience brackets to the overhanging eaves.

The corner oriel tower is constructed of red stone with three tall windows to each floor (the second-floor windows with toplights) and buff ashlar stone bands to lintels and sills. Beneath the slated turret are narrow arched lights below cusped mouldings.

Vicar Lane Elevation

The Vicar Lane (east) elevation is similar to New Briggate in construction and composition but reverses the red and buff colour scheme, has three-storey gables rather than four-storey, and no corner oriel tower. There are two shop fronts to the ground floor, with the northern shop extending from the south arcade across the former north arcade entrance to Merrion Street.

The upper elevation is built of buff ashlar blocks with red ashlar quoins, plinths and pinnacles to the gable ends, and red stone and terracotta window and string course facings to the gables. The central gable's two-storey four-light bay windows have an ornamental pierced second-floor parapet. Above are four deeply chamfered mullions which rise from pyramid corbels through the string courses to moulded and shaped finials and a central voluted pediment. They are broken by scalloped arched bands above three niches. Either side of the niches are scrolled and enriched faience panels.

The single bays of enriched Burmantofts faience match those to New Briggate but with four oculi windows rather than an arcade of tapered columns. To the west are three blocks of shops with three shop fronts to the ground floor.

Merrion Street Elevation

The Merrion Street (north) side elevation is constructed of red brick and is mostly two storeys, stepping up to the right with the topography. The eastern two-bay block forms the return to Vicar Lane and is built of buff ashlar blocks, with red ashlar and terracotta to the window surrounds and string courses. The first floor has a pair of windows with enriched and moulded terracotta surrounds containing segmental-arched one-over-one sashes. The second floor has three-light stone mullion windows with arched heads, and above are two small gablets and a central chimney stack.

To the right are three two-storey shops with end chimney stacks. The ground-floor shop fronts have surrounds with half-fluted and panelled Ionic pilasters and moulded friezes. Each first floor has two pairs of windows with a moulded cornice and projecting stone mullions with a shaped urn profile, and deeply recessed four-over-one pane sashes. The pitched roofs above have bracketed eaves.

Adjoining the shops is a gabled arcade entrance with two stone string bands to the upper gable, and a semi-circular arcade entrance with stone quoined jambs and a row-locked and moulded brick head containing a glazed multi-paned light.

To the right is the two-storey cinema block. The ground floor contains late 19th and 20th century ground-floor door and window openings (some infilled) and 21st century shop windows with a now blind first floor. The upper floor and three frieze bands have painted cinema signage reading 'TOWER' (upper floor), 'ALWAYS A GOOD PROGRAMME' and 'POPULAR PRICES' (frieze bands).

The two- and three-storey right-hand end forms the return elevation from New Briggate, with the upper floor of the two right-hand bays now obscuring the later pitched roof behind. It has 20th century openings to the ground floor, a pair of brick infilled flat-lintel arched windows with enriched and moulded terracotta surrounds to the first floor, and a ventilation grill to the second floor.

The rear (south) elevation was not seen during inspection. It adjoins the Grand Theatre in New Briggate.

Interior

The surviving two-storey south arcade runs east to west, connecting New Briggate with Vicar Lane, and is joined at its centre by a cross arcade from Merrion Street. It contains a variety of shops of varying sizes, with cellars or basements and first-floor store rooms. The pilasters, window frames, cornices and doors of the shops facing into the avenues are of mahogany, teak and other hardwoods.

The original shop surrounds have half-fluted and raised panelled Ionic pilasters and large glazed display windows to painted hardwood shop fronts (with lead-paned toplights and metal columns at the arcades crossing). The entrance doors are half-glazed and panelled and some are set back in porches with panelled soffits and enriched mosaic floor entrances (numbers 5 and 11).

The upper front walls over the shops are set back on both sides and contain three-light bay windows, apart from the western bays nearest New Briggate and the cross arcade to Merrion Street which have three-light windows with protruding mullions matching those to Merrion Street. Some leaded windows remain in the upper windows.

The arcade is covered by a glazed timber roof with bracketed eaves, supported by moulded arched and collared trusses resting on pilasters with moulded caps and bases. The double-height arches are now divided into two storeys with an upper room.

The New Briggate entrance has a glazed arch with a dentillated and moulded cornice. The Vicar Lane entrance has the relocated 1989 Potts of Leeds animated clock, featuring life-size figures of armoured knights which strike two bells and guardsmen (Irish, Scots, Canadian and Indian) that rotate through doors below the clock face on the hour. Above is a metal cockerel.

The cross arcade from Merrion Street has ground-floor shop fronts to the east and one to the west. The upper bays are predominantly blind apart from a late 20th century hexagonal wooden paned window to the west and two-light windows with protruding mullions shaped to an urn profile either side of the arcade. The south end of the cross arcade towards the Grand Theatre is now infilled with a shop. The cross arcade has an Art Nouveau balustraded stair.