135-153, Commercial Street

This is a group value building consisting of artisans’ flats, now shops and flats, built between 1863 and 1864 by Henry Darbishire for the Peabody Trust. The building is constructed of yellow brick with red brick dressings and stuccoed window arches, with a gabled slate roof and brick stacks. It rises to four storeys and has attics, with a 23-window range of fenestration pattern 3:2:4:2:4:2:4:2. The lower two storeys have channelled rustication marked by pilasters that lead to a moulded dentil cornice. Mid-19th century shop fronts with pilasters and half-glazed doors are present at numbers 135, 139, 141, 149, 151 and 153. The windows on the ground floor have flat rusticated brick arches over central doors, flanked by keyed flat arches over six-pane sashes. Similar six-pane sash windows are found on the first floor. Upper storeys feature keyed and stuccoed segmental arches and ogee arches to the gabled bays, all over six-pane sashes. The attic windows have keyed architraves. A rounded corner appears at Folgate Street, facing outwards, and is fronted by a stack with three tall windows set in rusticated semi-circular arches flanking a doorway set in a keyed brick architrave with pilasters to a dentilled entablature. The Folgate Street elevation is similar but includes a pedimented entrance and lacks shop fronts. The interior has not been inspected. This building represents the earliest construction for the Peabody Trust and is a key example of mid-Victorian philanthropic housing aimed at artisans, originally planned to include shops, dwellings, laundries, drying areas and bathing facilities.