Refuge House

ROYAL LEAMINGTON SPA

SP3165NE PARADE 1208-1/7/285 (West side) 19/11/53 No.150 Refuge House

GV II

House, now bank and offices. c1835 with later additions and alterations including early-C20 ground floor, and late-C20 banking hall and extension to rear. Pinkish-brown brick with painted stucco front facade and ashlar ground floor, Welsh slate roof and cast-iron balcony. EXTERIOR: 3 storeys, 3 first-floor windows. Tuscan pilasters through first and second floors to ends and between windows. First floor: tall 6/6 sashes in tooled surrounds with frieze and cornice. Second floor has 3/6 sashes in plain reveals and with moulded sills. Frieze, dentil cornice. Ground floor projects. Roll-moulded plinth. Arcade of 5 Ionic columns on plinths. Entrance to 4th arcade, 6-panel double-doors with fanlight with decorative glazing, with hollow-moulded round arch. Plate-glass windows with divided overlights. All openings have horizontal rustication to surrounds and central stepped keystones. Modillion cornice. Segmental pediment over 4th. arcade with foliate decoration with beehive, inscribed 'NOTHING WITHOUT LABOUR' and surmounted by balcony. End stack. INTERIOR: shutters; 6-panel doors; moulded cornices; narrow-openwell staircase from first to second floor has stick balusters. Service staircase has turned balusters. HISTORICAL NOTE: the Parade was so-named in 1860, Originally called Lillington Lane, it was renamed Union Row c1809. The lower section was laid out c1810-1814 and extended towards Dormer Place c1835. Built as houses, hotels and lodging-houses, by 1850 many had become shops. Ground floor forms a continuous architectural unit with No.148 (qv). (Cave LF: Royal Leamington Spa Its History and Development: Chichester: 1988-: 33, 36-37; Manning JC (Facsimile by Warwickshire County Council 1988): Glimpses of our Local Past .. Royal Leamington Spa: Royal Leamington Spa: 1895-: 138).

Listing NGR: SP3178665709