Ambler House

Ambler House comprises shops, offices, storerooms, and a dining room, constructed between 1869 and 1875. It includes numbers 2 and 3 Ambler House, Trevelyan Square. The building underwent alterations in the early and mid-20th century, and is possibly by the hand of Thomas Ambler. It is built of ashlar, with a decorative fishscale grey slate roof, and stands in an Italianate style. The building is four storeys high with an attic, and consists of five bays, reflecting the separate properties and presenting a symmetrical facade, arranged a,b,c,b,a.

The central bay features a tripartite round-headed window on the first and second floors, incorporating fluted pilasters, a deep first-floor sill cornice, and a triangular pediment above the second-floor window. The third floor has a three-light shouldered arch window, with a balustered sill. A dormer is situated beneath a segmental arch with a pavilion roof. Bays 2 and 4 originally featured windows similar to the central bay, though bay 2’s first-floor window was later replaced. The second floor retains a plain architrave to bay 4. The third floor windows are square-headed, with vertical banding to the architraves and a diamond motif to the sill band.

A central shop entrance is encased in early 20th-century detailing, including pilasters with festoons and cartouches under a modillioned cornice, and boarded 20th-century shop fronts. A pierced stone parapet extends across the central three bays, with property divisions marked by plinths and ornate ball finials, one of which survives. Bays 1 and 5 have two plain rectangular windows on each floor, set slightly lower than the central bays, and splayed corners. An oriel turret rises from the second floor, featuring mullion and transom windows and a steep tent-shaped spire. The right return elevation has four bays with fenestration mirroring the front facade, and bay 5 contains a plain doorway with an overlight and smaller windows. The left return is similar. The rear of the property was redeveloped and rebuilt in 1993.

The interior was not inspected. Historical records show that in 1869, the land on the newly widened Boar Lane was divided into five narrow lots. The new buildings were carefully designed to take advantage of the site, with the detailing of the central bay (No.16) resembling that of Nos 1-11 Boar Lane, suggesting the involvement of the same architect. By 1872, only No.16 was occupied by a tailor. By 1875, the block was fully occupied, housing a chemist, offices for the Singer Manufacturing Company and a mining engineer (No.14), a chemist and the Imperial Tea Company (No.15), a wine and spirits merchant (No.17), and a dining room (No.18).