52-55, Newington Green

Nos. 52-55 Newington Green, Islington

A terraced group of four consecutive houses, dated 1658 in a panel above the central pilaster, and possibly built by Thomas Pidcock. They are Grade I listed as rare survivals of pre-Restoration and pre-Great Fire town houses, representing one of the most remarkable groups of seventeenth-century buildings in London.

The houses are constructed of red brick laid in English bond. No. 52 has a slate roof; the remainder have tile roofs. They range from four to five storeys with two windows each. The ground floor features a central round arch to a passage leading to the rear, nineteenth-century pilasters with bracketed fascia stops, and twentieth-century shop fronts between the houses. The first and second floors have flat-arched windows set between a giant order of Doric pilasters with entablature. The windows are positioned almost flush with the wall at these levels; those to nos. 53-55 have 6/6 sashes of original design, though all or most are presumed replacements. Each first-floor window is surmounted by a slightly projecting round arch with a square panel recessed in the tympanum.

No. 52 has lost its cornice and possesses a flat-arched window in the rebuilt gable. A flat-arched, two-light window with ovolo mullion survives in the light-well. No. 53 is rebuilt from the entablature upwards with flat-arched windows set under a slightly projecting segmental arch and brick coping to the gable. No. 54 retains an additional third floor, recently rebuilt with parapet and dormer. No. 55 is rebuilt similarly to no. 53. The rear elevations are of brown brick with mostly segmental-arched windows, likely later in date than the fronts, and substantially rebuilt.

Each house displays an unusual plan with a central dog-leg staircase positioned between chimneybreasts.

No. 52 contains a staircase with turned newels to the ground and first floors and square newels to the second and third, the latter topped with a ball finial. Bulbous turned balusters are visible to the third floor but enclosed below, along with dado panelling between ground and second floors. The first-floor front room, now subdivided, retains panelling and a plaster cornice on the side and west walls. The rear room has panelling on the north wall only and a cornice on all but the west wall. The second-floor front room has a dado to the front wall only.

No. 53 has a staircase with square newels featuring ball finials and turned pendants, bulbous turned balusters, chamfered rail, and closed string. Closets flank some fireplaces, and some original floorboards survive. The ground-floor back room contains a back door with hooks for door bars, lower wall panelling, and an eighteenth-century flat-arched moulded architrave with keystone to the fireplace. A late eighteenth or early nineteenth-century grate occupies the first-floor back room. The second-floor front room has a late seventeenth-century flat-arched moulded architrave with an early-to-mid-nineteenth-century grate, while the back room contains a strap-hinged plank door connecting to no. 52.

No. 54 retains an early eighteenth-century staircase with square chamfered newels topped with slightly domed forms, column-on-vase balusters (many recently remade), and closed string. The first-floor front room has panelling to the chimneypiece only. The second-floor front room contains dado panelling; the back room has panelled closets and part of a wooden cornice.

No. 55 possesses a staircase with square newels featuring ball finials, bulbous turned balusters, and closed string running from basement through full height. Panelling survives in part on the front and side walls of the first-floor front room. The back room contains an eighteenth or early nineteenth-century cast-iron grate, with walls partly painted in imitation of panelling. The second-floor back room retains a small amount of surviving panelling. The original roof structure of this house survives.

The houses underwent restoration: no. 55 by the Greater London Council circa 1983-4, and nos. 53-54 by English Heritage circa 1987-8.