1 Windrush Square (Black Cultural Archives) and Raleigh Hall, 1a and 1b Saltoun Road

1 Windrush Square (Black Cultural Archives) and Raleigh Hall, 1a and 1b Saltoun Road

1 Windrush Square was originally two separate houses built around 1810 and underwent substantial alterations over the following centuries. The pair of buildings were converted to museum and archive use in 2014. Raleigh Hall, a public hall built around 1880 and raised to two storeys shortly afterwards, is attached to and extends eastwards from the southern end of 1 Windrush Square. This building was converted to workshop and studio use in the 1990s.

1 WINDRUSH SQUARE (BLACK CULTURAL ARCHIVES)

The main structure is rendered brick with a flat roof featuring half-hipped slated sections to north and south. Window openings contain mainly new or replacement sash frames.

The building forms a rectangular plan aligned north-south, with its principal west-facing elevation overlooking Windrush Square. A remodelled former entrance bay with a bowed section is located at the southern end. The principal elevation is three storeys high and seven bays wide, with the northern four bays originally belonging to the northern house and the southern three bays to the southern house. At the northern end sits a bowed balustraded bay, which was raised around 2014, with its ground-floor window replaced by a door.

The building features a cornice with dentil course and a plain parapet. The ground floor is arcaded with archivolts linked by an impost string; recessed round-headed glazed doors, mostly early-20th-century, fill these openings, with the central four doors replacing original windows. Upper windows have moulded eared architraves. Area lighting to the basement has been covered over. The former entrance bay to the south has been remodelled without its door opening, and the dentil cornice continues across this section and the two-storey bowed bay to the east. The unrendered rear elevation contains two double-height bows to the south and a projecting two-storey section to the north, showing evidence of extensive rebuilding. The lower half of the southern bow was removed to allow access to the stair serving the Raleigh Hall billiard room and has since been largely or wholly rebuilt.

The 2014 conversion involved re-ordering the internal plan, including the loss of the wall that formerly divided the two buildings and the removal of the two original staircases. A new stair was constructed in the northern part of the building. All internal historic features such as moulded cornices, skirtings, architraves, and window shutters are thought to belong to the circa 2014 renovation. The 2014 extension is excluded from the listing.

RALEIGH HALL

The building is constructed of yellow brick (described as 'Malms' in 1893 sales particulars) to the front elevation with red-brick dressings, whilst the rear elevation uses greyer London stock brick. The hipped roof is slate-covered, with a brick stack rising to the north and a shorter one to the north-east. Timber windows are almost entirely replacements.

The building is roughly rectangular on plan, opening to Saltoun Road to the south, with a single-storey section extending to the rear.

On the principal south-facing elevation, the original ground floor contains three segmental-arched openings set within red-brick pilastered architraves, separated by tall recessed arches. The uses of these openings have changed over time; an 1885 depiction suggests all three may originally have been windows. The original ground floor is crowned by a corbel cornice. Above this, a later storey contains three windows positioned above each ground-floor opening and flanked by pilasters; the cornice beneath the outer first-floor windows has been broken through. The first floor is topped by its own moulded cornice with a parapet above, the pilasters continuing into the parapet with recessed panels between them. At the eastern end, a narrow set-back bay contains an entrance with windows above. This bay originally provided a side entrance to the hall and a passage to the rear building, as well as ancillary spaces for the hall and billiard room, but has undergone substantial alteration and rebuilding.

The rear elevation is functional in appearance with cambered-arched windows. Half-height windows above the single-storey section provide clerestory lighting to the hall. The elevation shows evidence of change, including the raising of the building and the removal of a stair structure to the west.

The ground floor space, originally the public hall, remains open with a deep coved and moulded cornice. The room retains skirtings, door and window architraves. Original double doors survive, connecting the hall with the single-storey rear section, which formerly housed the refreshment room and other facilities. This rear section is now in workshop use and does not retain historic features. On the first floor, the boarded roof of the former billiard room remains exposed, featuring four trusses of chamfered timbers with scrolled braces supporting the collars. The space is now accessed from a new stair in the eastern bay and by an external stair to the north. All fireplaces within the building have been removed.