Late C19 engine house at Trowse Sewage Pumping Station

Late 19th-century engine house at Trowse Sewage Pumping Station

A former steam-powered engine house built around 1869, possibly to designs by Alfred Morant, city engineer to Norwich Corporation, with Daniel Balls of Norwich as the main contractor. The building has been subject to later alterations.

The engine house is constructed of red brick with dressing of yellow and blue engineering brick and a slate roof. It is rectangular in plan, aligned north-west to south-east, and stands immediately to the north-east of a replacement engine house (Grade II) built in 1909. An adjoining ancillary range to the east, comprising a contemporary boiler house, workshop, smithy and coal store, is not included in the listing as it is not of special interest.

The three-storey building above a deep basement (which housed the compounding chamber) is defined by clasped corner pilasters. The north and south elevations have single recessed panels, while the east and west elevations have two recessed panels formed by a central pilaster. The recessed panels have flat heads with corbelled brackets, as does the eaves cornice to the oversailing hipped roof. All windows and door openings are round-headed with keystones decorated with carved scrollwork motifs. The surrounds feature alternating red and yellow brick on the front and rear elevations, and alternating red and blue engineering brick to the returns. Windows are iron-framed with rectangular panes, radial heads and concrete sills.

The principal south elevation is expressed as two storeys. The main entrance on the first floor is accessed by a dog-leg staircase leading to a double doorway flanked by paired windows. The second (beam) floor has taller windows consisting of a wide central window flanked by paired windows, spanned by a bracketed cornice. On the ground floor, to the right of the staircase, is a tall carriage arch with double doors.

The rear north elevation has identical architectural treatment to the south façade, except that a ground-floor window and a tall window replace the doorway.

The west return is expressed as four storeys with a moulded plinth and a central doorway above which is a weatherboarded lucarne. Each floor has four window bays, with first-floor windows being taller. On the third floor, a bracketed cornice spans the width of each recessed panel at sill level.

The east return is now obscured by a late 20th-century addition above the boiler house. The symmetrical detailing shown on the west side probably exists within this later range, though the windows have been infilled.

The interior has not been inspected, but photographic and documentary evidence confirms that all original machinery has been stripped from the building, with the exception of an air receiver tank situated under the main staircase. An original spiral staircase rises from the first floor to the second (beam) floor.