Former Gas Showroom

A purpose-built gas showroom of 1912 with adjoining rear workshops of 1904, located at 39-40 King Street, Great Yarmouth. The designer is unknown.

The showroom and workshops are constructed of red brick laid in Flemish bond with stone dressings and slate-covered gable roofs. The showroom is rectangular in plan, while the workshop has an L-shaped plan.

The showroom rises three storeys and is five bays wide on the upper storeys. The ground floor features two segmental arches forming the show windows and entrance. The main slate-covered roof runs parallel to the street with gables at either end, beneath which runs a stone cornice supported in heavy details and a parapet. The three-bay right-hand section of the façade is defined by pilasters with finials at roof level. Projecting slightly forward, this section is topped by a gable with decorative red brickwork in a chequer-board design with horizontal stone banding and stone edging supported on dentils terminating in single roundels. The gable is surmounted by a 1912 date stone with pediment above, and an additional 2008 date plaque was added beneath.

The second floor has three segmental-headed windows to the right bay and two to the left, each with stone dressings, fluted keystones and stone sills supported on shallow corbels. Each window contains two-over-two sliding sashes. The first floor has the same window configuration, except the sills sit immediately above a delicate dentilled string course forming the upper border of a blank shop fascia. This fascia once supported the name of the Great Yarmouth Gas Company on the right bay and the phrase "Lighting and Heating" to the left.

At ground floor level are two elliptical-headed display windows with rusticated voussoirs and heavy triple keystones, which once supported a projecting gas lamp. The original fenestration of large panes of glass with opening lights above the transom survives. The right-hand window contains the doorway to the building, consisting of double wooden doors flanked by colonettes decorated with acanthus leaves, which support a moulded lintel. The left-hand display window retains the original "show rooms" enamel lettering.

The north elevation has a plain brick pier and panel gable with two casement windows. Beneath, the first and second floors have six windows with segmental brick surrounds, separated by piers running the height of the building and horizontal stone string courses between each floor. The ground floor has a display window in the same style as on the façade.

The rear workshop is constructed from red brick laid in Flemish bond, is L-shaped, and has a slated gable roof and chimney with moulded cornice. The first and second floors have arched windows with brick surrounds and stone lintels, six of which retain original glazing of 12 lights. Above the central window on the main range is a datestone bearing the initials of the Great Yarmouth Gas Company and the date 1904. The north elevation features an arched entrance at ground level, adjacent to a display window.

The interior of the main showroom is accessed through the main entrance, which leads to a timber and glass inner porch with a rubber mat detailed with the name of the Great Yarmouth Gas Company. Beyond lies the main showroom with a decorated plaster ceiling, wooden panelling, parquet flooring and a raised timber dais forming a display area in the windows, which steps up to the cashier's platform. Immediately beyond the entrance door is a timber double-return staircase, lit from the first floor landing by a stained glass window. The first floor showroom at the front of the building retains original joinery. The queen and king post roof trusses are exposed on the second floor. The workshop retains floorboards and glazing, and the workings of a gas lift at second floor level.

The Great Yarmouth Gas Company had offices at 39-40 King Street since at least 1869 and is known to have based its showroom at 42 King Street for a number of years before building the workshops in 1904, followed by the purpose-built showroom in 1912 on the site of two Georgian houses. Historic photographs of the exterior and interior confirm that the showroom has been little altered. The rear workshop has a small single-storey extension to the rear, though most of the fixtures and fittings have been lost, including the gas-powered lift, which has been removed to a museum. This is a very good example of a purpose-built gas showroom: the earliest known example is in Derby, dating from 1889.