12-14A, Clerkenwell Green

12-14A, Clerkenwell Green is a commercial building, now offices, dating from 1878 and designed by T.E.J. Channing of Holloway. The building is constructed of yellow stock brick with red brick dressings, cast stone, moulded brick decoration, cast iron window mullions and railings, and stone coping to the gables, all under slate roofs. It is arranged over three and four storeys with basements, and comprises a row of four commercial premises, likely originally workshops. The building displays an eclectic High Victorian style incorporating Gothic and Queen Anne elements.

The endmost buildings, Nos. 12 and 14A, project slightly forward and are of four storeys, terminating in shaped gables. Nos. 13 and 14, in the centre, are of three storeys with mansards. The ground floors feature panelled entrance doors to the right of wide, four-light glazed fronts, with pilasters having foliate capitals and narrow friezes above the doors. Decorative moulded brick panels are located between Nos. 13 and 14, depicting an urn with sunflowers and roses at frieze level. The basements have areas with wide windows carried on pairs of cast iron mullions; original cast iron foliate railings remain in front of Nos. 12 and 14A. Tripartite windows are present on the first and second floors, featuring segmental-arched central lights flanked by narrow side-lights, with mullions of cast stone on Nos. 12 and 14A, and ornamental brick piers elsewhere. The windows are mainly pivoting sashes. Bands of moulded stonework and keystones, all ornamented with floral detail, are also present. The third floors of the endmost buildings rise as ogee-shaped gables containing Diocletian windows within arched openings of banded red brick, with roundels of moulded terra cotta interrupting the gable profiles. The inner pair of buildings have stepped brick eaves and large mansards above, with the mansard to No. 13 being renewed recently.

The interior was not inspected, but the ground floors have been significantly altered. Upper floors retain original tongue and groove boarding to the walls and ceilings.

The building was constructed by Holloway builder and developer T.E.J. Channing and was initially occupied by the Lewis Incandescent Gas Company in 1885. It is a characteristic survival of High Victorian commercial premises, built within an area historically associated with metalworking. The fronts are richly detailed and incorporate a variety of materials, reflecting the design tendencies of the period.