34-38, RATCLIFFE ROAD

This is a range of three attached houses built in 1893 by Amos Hall of Leicester, with No. 38 extended in the late 20th century. The houses are constructed of red brick in English bond, featuring stone dressings on the north front. They have a steeply-pitched clay plain tile roof with coped gables and large brick axial stacks with polygonal shafts.

The houses are two stories high, with an attic and cellar. The south garden front is almost symmetrical, with the left and right houses projecting and featuring twin gables. The larger outer gables have large two-story brick polygonal bay windows, with brick pilastered ground floor windows and three-light windows above, which have raised centre lights in elliptically arched recesses. The attic windows above are shallow bows, with the left window replaced. The central house has a recessed two-bay front with an elaborate composition of timber bay windows; the ground floor features a bowed design with pedimented garden doors, while the first floor has small panes and pedimented centre lights, along with integral side-lights. There are two attic dormers in the roof above with segmental pediments.

The rear, or north side, has a gabled center with stone bands and stone window frames, and there is a small courtyard enclosed by a tall brick wall, which features an elliptical arched carriageway and a round arch for a pedestrian doorway.

The interior of No. 36 retains many original features, including chimneypieces with eared moulded architraves, ceiling cornices, and joinery such as panelled doors and butler's pantry cupboards. It also boasts a fine open-well moulded string staircase with a heavy balustrade of turned balusters and square newels, as well as a two-bay arcaded screen at the foot of the stairs.

Overall, this range of large late Victorian houses is a well-designed example of the Domestic free-style by a local architect.