2 Wardrobe Place

MATERIALS: red brick laid in Flemish bond, sootwashed; top storey yellow stock brick; stucco dressings.

PLAN: four storeys above a double basement; central dog-leg stair with one room to either side.

EXTERIOR: off-symmetrical facade of five bays with plat bands between storeys. The central entrance is set in a deep moulded stucco arched surround with guilloche moulding to the lintel; raised panelled door. Windows have moulded stucco architraves; those to the ground floor with bracketed cills. C19 or later 2-over-2 pane sash windows. Triple pitch roof.

INTERIOR: the close-string stair from basement to second floor has heavy square newel posts with ball finials, drop finials and turned balusters; the top flight is partly reconstructed. The ground-floor southern room has a timber box cornice of late-C17 or early-C18 pattern and an early-to-mid C19 marble chimneypiece with a reeded surround and paterae ornament; the northern room has a reeded cornice. Both first-floor rooms have full-height panelling of an early-C18 type with ovolo mouldings, moulded dado rails and box cornices. The north room has arched alcoves to either side of the chimneybreast. Each of the second-floor rooms has an overmantel painting: that to the south room depicts an ice-skating scene with figures in C17 dress; that to the north room a large country house in a formal C17 landscape; both are set within fictive gilt frames. The south room has a plain black marble early-to-mid C19 chimneypiece with a good 1870s Aesthetic Movement grate made by Barnard, Bishop & Barnard foundry, Norwich, to a design by Thomas Jekyll. The attic rooms have no features of interest. The sub-basement consists of two cellars with brick vaults; that to the north has shelves for barrels. While it is possible that they could predate the building, their shallow vaulted form is typical of the C17 century, and their alignment with the present frontage suggests they are contemporary with the rest of the house.