Engine House And Chimney

The Engine House and Chimney, built around 1842 and possibly enlarged in 1865, is a two-storey structure made of stock brick with a later pantiled roof that has a fairly low pitch and kneelers at the gable ends. The west side has a blind return with flat buttresses on the first floor, while the east side is mostly blind with various filled-in openings and a corbelled parapet. The north end features part of a curved wall on the right and, on the left, a taller square battered chimney with a stone cornice and a blocking course above a brick corbel table. There is a round-arched window on the first floor with a brick string above it. The south side has an opening leading to the interior. A replica steel plate chimney stack was reinstated in 1993. Inside, the building has been restored as an exhibition space for Marc Brunel's machinery, which was originally housed here for the pumping machinery related to the first Thames tunnel, constructed between 1825 and 1853. The building is included for its historical associations with the Brunels.