The Crescent

The Crescent, Buxton

Hotel, assembly rooms and five lodging houses, later council premises, now vacant. Built 1780–88 with an addition around 1803, followed by 19th and 20th century alterations. Designed by John Carr of York for the fifth Duke of Devonshire, with the later additions possibly by J White. The building is constructed in ashlar, brick and dressed stone with ashlar dressings and Westmorland slate roofs, with cruciform stone stacks.

The Crescent is laid out in a crescent plan and follows the Neo-Classical style. The front elevation rises to three storeys with four storeys to the rear, above basements. The front presents a symmetrical semi-circular range of 29 windows, culminating in five-window facades at each end. The ground floor features a rusticated round-arched arcade containing 27 round-headed openings, with steps in front of arches 2, 8, 11, 14, 16, 22 and 23 (counting from right to left). The central doorway has been altered. To its left are three-light openings, windows, doors, and blocked doors in various arrangements; to the right are further windows and doors. All windows are glazing-bar sashes; doorways mostly retain six-panel doors and fanlights. Above the arcade are giant fluted Roman Doric pilasters with a blind balustrade and full entablature, topped by a balustrade with plain panels interspersed with shaped balusters. The central panel is carved with the Cavendish arms. The first floor has 23 plain sashes and six glazing-bar sashes to the right, separated from the second floor by a guilloche-pattern plat band. The second floor contains 29 glazing-bar sashes. The five-window end facades have similar articulation, with set-back ground-floor facades of four round-headed sashes each.

The left return has a five-window range with similar articulation, a blocked entrance at bay 1, blind first-floor windows, and second-floor windows with glazing-bar sashes. The right return displays a seven-window range with seven round-headed sashes on the first floor and seven blank panels above. The rear facade, rendered in dressed stone, rises four storeys. The ground floor contains tall round-headed windows, mostly blocked, and small square projections with stairs. The first and second floors have boarded glazing-bar sashes; the third floor has smaller glazing-bar sashes.

The interior of the former St Ann's Hotel retains some original features despite alterations. The vaulted cellars, serviced by a central passageway, are divided into secure rooms for wine storage and supplies. These retain four planked doors with strapped hinges within pegged architraves, now refronted with panelled doors, six-panel doors with low lock rails, stone flag floors, and a stone table. Window openings include two internal lunettes and an exterior window with a chamfered mullion. The east section preserves many wooden doors with top panels featuring bars for ventilation or vent holes. Two fireplaces with stone jambs and lintels survive, one with a narrow grate and the other larger.

The ground floor includes a later ornate dining-room addition to the rear, featuring massive moulded beams on double modillions in five rectangular panels and folding shutters to windows. The first floor contains cast-iron balusters to the stairs with a wreathed wooden handrail and columns to the landing. A glazed and engraved door with fanlight and raised spandrel panels, in an ornate doorcase with ovolo moulding, leads into the Smoking Room. The Drawing Room has an entrance door with engraved glass to its upper panels and an overlight, set in a moulded surround with entablature. The ceiling features shallow relief plasterwork of interlocking scrolls with a central roundel; the frieze displays a pattern similar to the cyclamen or "whiplash" style. An ornate fireplace with overmantel is present; another fireplace was removed at the time of survey, though an elaborate overmantel mirror remains.

The former Great Hotel, later the Crescent Hotel, features a semi-circular staircase rising from the right-hand entrance to the first-floor Assembly Room with canted corners. The Assembly Room has a coved ceiling with ornate Adam-style plasterwork and wall plaques. Marble fireplaces with overmantels, coved decorated alcoves, and ornate door cases with scrolled or triangular pediments are disposed around the room, which is articulated with an Order of Corinthian columns and engaged pilasters. The double-panelled doors are round-headed. The card room (measuring 2x2) adjoins the Assembly Room and has panelled doors.

The individual houses and the hotel were designed as separate units. Those attached to the hotel are connected by curved central corridors on each floor. Each unit has three windows to the front and five to the rear, with splayed internal walls following the curve of the Crescent. The units contain single-flight return staircases of cantilevered stone with iron balustrades and wooden handrails. Most retain some original decoration including doors, doorcases, and plasterwork, though many were modernised in the 19th century and preserve interesting period fireplaces, plasterwork, and panelling. Brick and stone vaulted cellars contain at least one later cooking range and slop stone sink.

The balustrade to the Great Stair was made by Thomas Smith of Chesterfield, the plasterwork to the Assembly Room by James Henderson of York, and the carving by Thomas Waterworth of Doncaster. The Crescent cost £38,601 18 shillings and 4 pence.