10-12 Museum Street

Terrace of shops, former offices and dwellings at 10-12 Museum Street, built around the 1820s and re-fronted circa 1863-1865, probably by Charles Parker, surveyor to the Duke of Bedford, to harmonise with the adjacent New Oxford Street development. The New Oxford Street scheme was laid out in the 1840s to plans by Sir James Pennethorne, Joint Architect and Surveyor for the Metropolitan Improvements to the Commissioners of Woods and Forests. The shopfronts and roofs underwent twentieth-century alterations, and numbers 11 and 12 were converted to studio flats in the 1990s.

The building is constructed of London stock brick faced in stucco to the front elevation, with slate and tile roof coverings and clay chimney pots. It comprises four storeys with shops at ground floor level and former offices or residential premises on the upper three floors, latterly converted to studio flats. The basement contains former shop storage space, bathrooms and coal vaults.

The front façade spans six bays across two properties. The stuccoed surface is tooled to imitate ashlar stonework and framed by rusticated quoins. Numbers 10 and 11 each have a doorway beneath a transom light with plate-glass shop windows. Number 12 retains a doorway with transom light but features a roller shutter covering the former carriage entrance created in 1863-1865, which originally provided access to the rear yard. The ground floor pilasters are stuccoed with fielded panels and large, highly decorative scrolled consoles.

The sash windows above are set in moulded architrave surrounds with fielded panels and enriched with scrolled consoles bearing floral decoration, supporting moulded cornices. The first and second floors have six-over-six sashes with narrow glazing bars, reflecting classical proportions with the piano nobile at first-floor level. The third floor, or attic storey, contains three-over-six pane sashes, shorter in height. Above the third floor sits a heavy dentilled cornice beneath a parapet. Later flat roofs are covered in asphalt with twentieth-century roof access porches. Large chimney stacks with clay chimney pots are built into the party walls.

The south elevation onto West Central Street has a single ground-floor entrance doorway with transom light, and blocked windows with moulded architrave surrounds and cills carried on corbels to the upper floors. Rusticated quoins and a heavy dentilled cornice beneath the roof parapet continue the detailing. The rear west elevation is of rendered brick with six-over-six sash windows; number 11 Museum Street was extended around the 1990s by an additional bay in cream-coloured brick, which is blind at the rear but features eight-over-eight sash windows to the sides.

Number 10 Museum Street originally contained a shop to the ground floor with two rooms on each residential floor above. The ground floor retains joinery including moulded door surrounds, skirtings and an architrave containing modern shelves, together with a fireplace without surround. An early-nineteenth-century dog-leg staircase with twisted mahogany handrail and stick balusters provides access between floors. The first-floor front room has a blocked fireplace with fitted cupboard to one side and coving with foliate decoration to the ceiling; the rear room contains a blocked fireplace without surround. The second floor is similar, with fitted cupboards flanking a fireplace featuring a timber surround and mantle shelf in the front room, and another fireplace to the rear. The third floor retains a cast-iron cooking range with oven (missing its door), open fire and hot plate flanked by a cupboard in the front room, and a fireplace with decorative arched cast-iron register grate and wooden surround in the rear room. Original joinery survives in the upper rooms, including moulded door and window surrounds, cornices and skirtings, though doors are modern flush or panelled types. Bathrooms with 1990s or 2000s fixtures and fittings have been inserted. The basement probably originally contained a kitchen, scullery and storage room but has been largely stripped of fixtures except for a probable range obscured behind modern formwork blocking a recess. A brick fireplace remains with missing surround, and the opening has been knocked through to the adjacent property. A small bathroom with modern sanitary ware and a room containing a modern sink unit occupy the rear. The front room has sash windows to the basement light well, beyond which stand a pair of original brick coal vaults.

Numbers 11 and 12 probably originally had similar basement arrangements, but have been extensively altered. Number 11 largely contains twentieth-century fixtures and fittings including floor surfaces, false ceilings, fixed shelving and bathroom sanitary ware. Number 12 has been stripped and altered as part of nightclub use. The basement light wells and brick coal vaults remain in both properties. The ground floor of number 11 is currently empty and largely stripped, with some steel RSJs inserted, although skirting boards survive. A nightclub exit occupies the former carriageway through the ground floor of number 12. The front doorway to number 12 leads to a hallway with tiled floor and modern fitted mirrors. The upper floors of both properties have been converted into studio flats. A 180-degree turn winder staircase with 1990s treads, panels and handrails provides access to one flat per floor in number 12 and two flats per floor in number 11. The studio flats contain 1990s or 2000s fixtures throughout, including six-panelled doors, plasterboard partitions, fitted cupboards, modern kitchen units, bathrooms and showers.