St Michael's House, 2 Elizabeth Street

St Michael's House, 2 Elizabeth Street

Parish community centre or clubhouse designed in 1938 by N F Cachemaille-Day, now offices.

The building is constructed with a steel frame clad in plum-coloured Dutch brick laid in Flemish bond, with concrete (painted white) and engineering brick dressings. Windows are metal-framed and roofs are flat.

The building occupies a tight corner site with its front elevation facing south onto Elizabeth Street and a prominent side elevation facing Eccleston Place. The main body is rectangular on plan with a five-storey front section and a stair tower protruding above it. A two-storey lower wing extends to the rear, with a basement beneath the whole building. At the rear, accessed from the principal staircase at half landing level, is a tall, narrow, apsidal-ended chapel with its main side elevation on Eccleston Place. The five levels of accommodation are served by two adjacent staircases, lit by windows that are a feature of the east elevation. Stairs from the entrance hall descend to the former gymnasium and changing rooms at basement level.

The front elevation is symmetrical in five bays over five storeys, with fenestration set in from the outer corners, creating blank panels to each side. The entrance is set forward in a moulded masonry architrave with rounded flanks and a flat canopy with stepped fascia. Above the doors is a blind 'overlight' panel, with a pair of four-panelled doors set further back within the entrance. The entrance is approached by a pair of deep concrete steps with a threshold laid out in a concrete grid inset with glass setts, flanked by curved brick parapet walls forming a quadrant on each side.

Windows are paired metal casements of three lights arranged vertically either side of a cylindrical mullion, painted white, set in deep-set openings with quadrant-cut engineering brick reveals and slender concrete cills and lintels, also painted white. Above the fourth floor is a simple cornice extending slightly beyond the window openings. Attic storey windows are metal casements beneath a continuous lintel, with a plain parapet above having concrete coping. Foundation stones set into the brick fabric record the architect N F Cachemaille-Day F.R.I.B.A. and the contractors C.H. Gibson Ltd. of Croydon.

The dramatic side elevation to Eccleston Place is achieved by the vertical accent provided by parallel stair windows in the front block and the height of the stair tower, combined with the austere minimal treatment given to the chapel.

The stair windows read as single glazed strips made up of smaller metal-framed panes. Each has paired lights in slightly chamfered architraves between a central brick pier, deep-set in engineering brick reveals with slender cill and lintel, painted white. Below each is a deep-set horizontal tripartite window opening with slender cill, lintel and mullions, providing clerestorey glazing to the basement room. Centrally placed above the stair windows is a gargoyle-like projecting moulded base and smaller head at the respective roof levels that appears to be the mounting for a statue. To the left is a stepped, moulded doorcase with a pair of deep-set part-glazed doors.

The chapel has stark simplicity, with a flush surface apart from three very narrow lancet windows set precisely within the outer wall and ranks of narrow slit openings which pierce the parapet. The lancets have rounded heads and projecting painted concrete cills, with windows containing robust rectangular leaded lights with a top-hung hopper. The roof is hidden behind a tall parapet pierced by square-headed openings and has a concrete coping. The corresponding piers of the western wall rise to the same height above the flat roof. A connecting lintel appears to have been removed.

Beyond the chapel is a rear entrance in a deep, stepped moulded architrave; the doors have been replaced.

The west elevation is blank except for a single six-light ground floor window in a plain reveal. The rear north wall and return of the lower rear wing have metal-framed windows grouped between brick piers beneath continuous cills and lintels, giving them horizontal emphasis.

Interior

Stairs rise the full height of the building while parallel secondary stairs run from ground floor level to third floor. In both cases, masonry stairs are built against the inner window reveal, creating a full-height space between the mullions and glazing which is attached to chamfered masonry spurs. The main stair has an oak balustrade and at the half landing entrance to the chapel has a curved outer profile and a robust masonry newel. Within the inner curve is a recess with an oak cill which corresponds with the window cill. A similar stair with terrazzo steps and dado and an oak-lined recess descends to the basement from the entrance hall. Built into the panelled balustrade at hall level is a post box. The entrance hall has a wood parquet floor. Throughout the building, doorcases have channelled and mitred frames. Doors are now clad in flush fire-resistant panels. The basement room, originally the gymnasium, has a double-width masonry doorcase with a curved profile, echoing the main entrance doorcase.

The chapel is a tall, narrow space beneath a barrel-vaulted roof with plain rear arches to the windows. It is unadorned except for the apse. The apsidal end wall is lined in coffered timber panelling, now painted gold. Above, the apse roof is lined in a mosaic in Byzantine manner by Eric Newton. It depicts Christ beneath a starry firmament and above a scrolled, wavy sea, holding an opened book which reads: IN THIS PLACE / WILL I / GIVE PEACE. To the left is inscribed: PEACE / I LEAVE / WITH YOU / MY PEACE I / GIVE UNTO YOU. To the right: NOT AS / THE WORLD / GIVETH / GIVE I / UNTO YOU.

The chapel has a pair of oak part-glazed doors beneath a round-arched overlight, with quadrant mouldings in the angles such that the frames are in the form of a cross. It has a terrazzo threshold, but elsewhere the floor is hidden beneath a timber platform which raises the floor level.