Minerva House, North Crescent

CAMDEN

TQ2981NE CHENIES STREET 798-1/99/204 (North side) Minerva House, North Crescent

GV II

Former car showroom and repair workshop with offices over. 1912-13. By George Vernon. For the Minerva Motor Company. Portland stone ashlar. EXTERIOR: 4 storeys 5 bays. Symmetrical design with a concave front corresponding to the crescent. Ground floor openings with rounded corners have billet moulding and are separated by thin V-profile fillets. Entrances in outer bays segmental-arched with Mannerist detail; part-glazed panelled double doors, inscribed above "Minerva House", and overlights. Window openings formerly with sliding shutters and mahogany folding doors. The articulation of the upper 3 storeys corresponds to the ground floor, with narrower flanking bays set over the doors. Very slender engaged columns rise through the full height culminating in stylised Doric entablatures with wreaths and drops at bays. Bowed, stone transom and mullion windows, 4-light to central bays, 3-light to outer, with small panes and Ionic half-column jambs; panelled spandrel panels between 1st and 2nd floor. 3rd floor central bay supports swag enriched base to triumphal arch feature containing a carved statue of Minerva in front of a window. Flanking bays have enriched broken pediments with cartouches. Outer bays repeat the arch motif on a smaller scale to windows with swagged aprons. Cast-iron railings to bays 2 and 4. INTERIOR: not inspected.

Listing NGR: TQ2956581862