53, Regent Place

BIRMINGHAM

997/0/10254 REGENT PLACE 29-APR-04 53

II Offices, formerly paper warehouse and offices. 1906 with late C20 alterations. By J.H. Hawkes and Son, architects, for T.W. Watson. Smooth red brick with buff-coloured terracotta dressings and banding, plain gables and a Welsh slate roof covering. PLAN : L-shaped building enclosing small triangular rear yard. EXTERIOR: 3 storeys above a basement, 3 bays, with single entrance to left-hand bay. Doorway within moulded terracotta surround and a segmental pediment above a joggled head. C20 6-panel door with concealed overlight. To the right, basement light with glass bricks within metal frames beneath buff terracotta band. Above, single and paired sash windows with moulded surrounds, sill band and lintel band, the windows set behind fixed metal bars. Moulded string course above continues over doorway pediment. First floor with 3, 3-light multi-pane transomed windows with flat heads within segmental brick arch-headed openings with serpentine string course above. Sill bands to both upper floors, the second floor with central raised pediment, enclosing tall, wide semi-circular arch-headed window. Flanking shallow 3-light windows beneath wide eaves band. Rear range with blind west wall, and large transomed flat- headed windows to the east, between shallow brick piers. HISTORY: the architect's drawings show office accommodation to the street frontage at ground floor level and undivided storage and workspace to each upper floor, the latter additionally linked by a secondary stair to the rear range. A purpose- built warehouse of 1906, carefully detailed externally, and an important component of the complex manufacturing network within an industrial quarter of Birmingham now recognised as being of international significance.