63-64, LUDGATE HILL

This building is a manufactory and offices, dating from 1903, with alterations made in the late 20th century. It is located on Ludgate Hill, Birmingham, and forms a group with the adjacent building at No. 61 Ludgate Hill. The building was empty and damaged by fire at the time of inspection in September 2000.

The building is constructed of red brick with blue brick headers, pale buff brick, and terracotta dressings. It has an L-shaped layout, comprising an office and warehouse range facing the street and a rear workshop range. The asymmetrical street frontage is three storeys high, with a basement, and features four bays delineated by shallow pilasters. A narrow, off-centre entrance bay on the right has a diminutive terracotta pediment and finial. Further to the right is a vehicle entrance with boarded double doors beneath a flat brick arch. A boarded-up door is set within an elaborate terracotta surround incorporating paired Tuscan columns and consoles, supporting a broken pediment set against a rectangular plaque with a semi-circular moulding enclosing the date 1903. To the left of the entrance are two wide-span brick-arched window openings, now boarded up, with stepped brick cills. The upper floors are divided by a pier and panel design. The first floor has three-light transomed casements beneath banded elliptical arches of rubbed red brick and terracotta. The upper floor has paired windows beneath flat heads. A plain brick frieze band runs along the top of the building, above which is a shallow parapet with terracotta coping.

The rear workshop range is three storeys high and eight bays wide. The ground floor is now arcaded, dating back to the late 19th century, while the upper floors were remodelled in the early 20th century, featuring a flat roof and multi-paned steel window frames with concrete lintels.

The interior of the building was damaged by fire and has not been inspected. Early 20th-century directories indicate that the site was occupied by the same manufacturers as at No. 61 Ludgate Hill. Nos. 63-64, together with No. 61, define the eastern boundary of a recognized historic manufacturing district of international significance, characteristic of the Birmingham Jewellery Quarter.