15, 17 and 19 Shelton Street

Terrace of three houses and shops dating from the 18th and 19th centuries, restored and substantially remodelled between 1983 and 1985 by the Terry Farrell Partnership as part of the regeneration of Comyn Ching Triangle.

The buildings are constructed in buff-brown brick with matching dressings. Number 15 has stucco rendering. All three have slate-clad mansard roofs. Timber shop fronts and monumental entrances are features throughout. Stone paving, masonry parapet walls, steel gates, railings, balustrades and window guards complete the exterior treatment.

The restoration and new work use traditional materials interpreted in a contemporary way, creating a unified scheme. Windows and bold entrances are painted in striking colours: turquoise blue, black and deep red.

Plan and Layout

The terrace consists of three two-bay houses, each of three storeys with attics. Number 15's ground floor contains a monumental entrance designed by Farrell to Ching Court and to upper floor flats. Numbers 17 and 19 together form a restored 19th-century shop, with residential accommodation in the upper floors. Like other buildings on Shelton Street overlooking Ching Court, these upper floors are used for residential purposes.

Front Elevation

Number 15 Shelton Street features the principal entrance to Ching Court at ground level, flanked by entrances to the upper floor flats. The architectural language employs strong geometric forms and robust, oversized mouldings, apparently inspired by oriental gateways and European Baroque design. A retained 19th-century outer architrave with three orders of moulded jambs, lions' head mask capitals and a restored 19th-century fascia frames a reconfigured shop front. Within this sits a timber architrave with glazed overlight and open side entrances on a masonry plinth. Farrell's timber gateway beyond has moulded piers on square masonry bases and a deep, oversailing moulded cornice cranked upwards and painted deep red, like lacquer. This frames a covered lobby with timber panelling in the manner of the 18th century. Shallow steps to either side of the entrance rise to first floor flat doorways. Doors throughout are plain, flush-panelled in square or rectangular form, painted black. The passage beyond is lined with masonry piers treated as ashlar, carrying robust moulded brackets and cornice in red. A paved floor laid in a grid of polished masonry with unpolished inset squares leads to the threshold to Ching Court. An inner steel gate with geometric patterning closes the passage.

The upper floors have recessed six-over-six pane sashes. On the second floor these sit beneath flat arches; on the first floor they are set within shallow segmental arches. Both floors carry Farrell's window guards bearing the reversed CC Comyn Ching logo.

Numbers 17 and 19 Shelton Street retain a complete and impressive 19th-century shop front, restored by Farrell. Symmetrical in arrangement, it has a central entrance with paired part-glazed doors beneath a rectangular overlight with robust radiating glazing bars. Two shop window bays flank this entrance, each with segmental heads, fixed lights with slender glazing bars and pointed heads, and lower panels of diagonally set boards. Outer bays contain blind entrances: that to the right has an original door in a reeded surround; that to the left a simplified 20th-century version. Both have similar lower panels to the window bays, four moulded recessed upper panels and rectangular overlights with radiating glazing bars. Intervening moulded pilasters, paired at the outer bays, bear lions' head mask capitals. The entablature has a reeded outer edge and Farrell's Comyn Ching number plates.

Upper floors carry paired six-over-six pane sashes beneath flat arches, the first floor sashes being taller. These also have Farrell's window guards with the reversed CC Comyn Ching logo. All three houses have added flat-roofed dormers, enlarged on Number 17.

Rear Elevation

The rear entrance to Ching Court is framed by a wide, moulded doorcase in a bold Mannerist interpretation of 18th-century Baroque. The upper timber section, painted turquoise blue, is mounted on flared, moulded masonry parapet walls. Heavily moulded cornices with a concave centrepiece rise over the recessed entrance, which diminishes in square-section architraves beneath a small convex canopy responding to the cornice above. The parapet walls curve to contain a paved threshold laid out in concentric rings with a polished centrepiece, from which shallow concentric steps rise to Ching Court.

Full-height rear ground floor windows lighting the shop stairwell are partly sunk below court level and cut through the moulded masonry plinth behind a stepped area, varying in depth according to the slope. The rear entrance to Number 17 has a panelled door with square glazed lights in a robust moulded architrave painted black with a narrow cornice band in deep red. Upper floor windows are restored, generally six-over-six pane sashes with slender glazing bars. At Number 15, above the main entrance, these are painted deep red.

Interiors

The entrances to upper floor flats beneath the gateway open onto offset, acute-angled stairwells remodelled in the 1980s in the manner of the late 18th century. These have pine closed-string dog-leg stairs with turned balusters and newels alternating between square and cylindrical section, and concave bottom steps. Window reveals have panelled linings; doors are of six panels in simple moulded architraves.

The shop features bold 1980s box cornices. A stair within the shop leads to a basement gallery.