Garage and walls

The garage and associated walls date from 1914 and were built for Edmund Denison Taylor. It is an example of the Arts and Crafts style, designed as an elaborate garden pavilion. The garage is constructed of red brick, with some moulded brick and tilework, and features a plain tile, domed roof. It has a rectangular plan with canted corners, and is single-storied.

The front, facing Castledine Street, has a pair of part-glazed doors set within a wide, basket arch decorated with fine, splayed tilework. Above this is a tilework raised band, followed by a frieze of inset brick circles and another tilework band that continues around the entire building. The canted corners to the left, right, and rear have round windows with tilework keystones. Tall, oval windows with large tilework keystones are positioned to the sides, rising to the band and featuring splayed aprons that extend down to the building’s plinth. Above the frieze is a dentil cornice, with ornamental leadwork gutters and downpipes. The domed roof has a wrought-iron weather vane at its apex.

Attached to either side of the garage, curving out to the street and running parallel for approximately 10 metres, are brick boundary walls. These walls have sunk panels, each with a terracotta ornament within a moulded brick frame with curved corners. The walls are finished with a coped top.

The garage was built at the end of the garden of the property at 6 Burton Walks. E.D. Taylor, who had his own house designed in the Voysey style, commissioned the garage to house his Rolls-Royce. Taylor was a director of the Loughborough-based Taylor’s Bell Foundry, which was successful in casting bells, including Great Paul for St Paul's Cathedral in London, and exporting them internationally. The garage is of very high quality, exhibiting fine moulded brickwork and tilework decoration. It is comparatively rare for its date and has a grandeur appropriate to its original purpose.