49, Southwark Street

SOUTHWARK

TQ3280 SOUTHWARK STREET 636-1/2/709 (South side) No.49

GV II

Warehouse, now offices. 1867 By Ernest Bates of Manchester and London. For Robert J Bates. Stock brick with stone dressings and low pitched slate roof. Curved corner plan with recessed tower and hoist range to south bay of return. EXTERIOR: 4 storeys and semi-basement, with 8-window range including hoist bay. The top floor has a continuous arcade of 14 round-arched windows under segmental, pointed brick arches. The 1st and 2nd floor windows are recessed, with each bay articulated by tall chamfered brick piers surmounted at 2nd-floor level by segmental-pointed cut brick arches. The ground-floor openings are round-arched, recessed, and treated as a continuous arcade of slightly pointed cut brick arches supported by brick piers with stone capitals and bases. Elaborate and sharply cut brickwork to the bracketed cornice, arched openings and paterae in the spandrels between the ground-floor windows. Unusual Gothic fenestration with plate glass survives, as does the fanlight above the main entrance on Southwark Street, in the extreme easternmost bay. This doorway is flanked by 2 piers of Peterhead granite colonnettes with Corinthian capitals. The 4-panel double doors with pointed lights in the top panels are also of an authentic design. Projecting iron canopy to the 4th storey of tower shelters hoist range with iron bracket; the balconies are a later addition. Top floor of the hoist bay has a noteworthy exposed timber roof structure. INTERIOR: not inspected. Carefully restored during recent conversion to offices; an excellent adaptation of High Victorian Gothic style for commercial use. Forms a group with Nos 51 & 53 Southwark Street (qv).

Listing NGR: TQ3238480129