Numbers 38 To 39 (Consecutive) And Attached Railings

ISLINGTON

TQ3182NW WILMINGTON SQUARE 635-1/68/907 (North West side) 29/09/72 Nos.38-39 (Consecutive) and attached railings

GV II

Two terraced houses. 1819-1841; much rebuilt by Islington Council 1969. By John Wilson, builder for Lord Compton and the Spa Fields Estate. Yellow stock brick laid in Flemish bond with banded stucco ground-floor and stucco dressings; roofs obscured by parapet, stacks not visible. Originally probably side-hall entrance plan; now centre-hall entrance plan. Three storeys with basement; 5 windows each plus 1 window (blind) to left-hand return wall in Attneave Street. Symmetrical and double-fronted. Steps rise to entrance: round-arched doorway set in narrow stucco recess with fluted 1/4 column jambs carrying corniced-head, patterned fanlight, and C20 panelled door. Ground-floor round-arched sashes with 6/6 curved and radial glazing bars with raised basement sashes in lieu of panel below. Gauged-brick flat arches to upper storeys except 1st floor sashes. 1st floor stucco sill band beneath full-length 6/6 sashes with individual cast-iron balconies with anthemion and Vitruvian scroll pattern to railings. 2nd floor 3/3 sashes. Projecting stucco cornice and blocking course; plain brick parapet with stone coping to left return. Attached cast-iron railings with floral tops and pineapple finials. Wilmington Square was created from the Earls of Northampton's Spa Fields Estate, which in 1817 the 9th Earl asigned to his heir Lord Compton. The subsequent building in Wilmington Square was one of London's 1st post-Waterloo developments. Progress was piecemeal: the south terrace was the 1st and grandest; nos. 38-39 not completed until 1841. For financial reasons the square was reduced in depth and thus became a backwater on the fringes of estates. (The Squares of Islington: Cosh, M: The Squares of Islington Part I: Finsbury and Clerkenwell: Islington: 1990-: 93-98).

Listing NGR: TQ3111482546