Parachute Store at former RAF West Raynham

Parachute store, built between 1936 and 1939, later used as a Fabric Store and now (2022) as an industrial unit.

MATERIALS: built of monolithic poured concrete walls 12 inches thick with steel framed windows and cast iron rain goods throughout. The entrance consists of a steel outer door and timber inner door.

PLAN: rectangular in plan

EXTERIOR: a single storey, rectangular building with a glazed clerestory above. The north-west elevation has a row of three 15-pane steel casement windows with the clerestory lighting above in the form of six-pane open-lights horizontal steel casements. The south-east elevation is blind. The entrance, in the south-west end is formed small concrete porch on the south-west end provides the entrance marked by a steel door. Cast iron rain goods survive throughout.

Interior: internally the building measures 21ft wide, 48ft long with a height of 10ft at the lower level and 16ft into the clerestory. A small lobby at the north-east end is formed by the outer steel door of the entrance and an inner timber door. The lobby ensured the store remained as dust and moisture free as possible.

Fitted in the ceiling of the clerestory level are a series of hooks where parachutes could be hung from their apices. A suspended ceiling has been inserted across the clerestory level, but the hooks remain visible. A long table runs down the centre of the building and would have been used to lay rigging lines whilst parachutes were hung and to fold the parachutes. At the south-west end of the building are two storage rooms, likely to be storage areas for the packed and dried parachutes, away from harmful sunlight.