Machine Shop And Attached Range To West At Royal Ordnance Factory

TQ 39 NE 21/291

ORDNANCE ROAD Machine shop and attached range to west at Royal Ordnance Factory

GV II

Small arms factory. 1854-58 for Board of Ordnance. Yellow brick with facade in polycromatic brick with red brick dressings and alternate red and yellow brick voussoirs to arches. Gabled Welsh slate roofs. L-plan with range of subsidiary buildings to the SW of Machine Shop. Italianate style front to Machine Shop. One storey, 23 window range. 3-storey clock tower and belfry to centre, with blind arches to 2nd stage, semi-circular arches with keystones to 3rd stage, stone impost courses and corbelled brick cornice beneath hipped roof; lower stage has semi-circular arch over C20 door with fanlight. Windows with glazing bars set in semi-circular arches linked by red brick impost course; red brick corbelling beneath frieze of diaper work and moulded stone cornice. Right side elevation, partly in similar style with semicircular arches over doors and windows, has range of 9 north-light gables. Interior: 12 x 14 bays to front, defined by cast-iron columns at roughly 20 ft. intervals, supporting wrought-iron trusses with rooflights; some replacements of late C20. Original columns cast with Board of Ordnance initials. Central brick wall, painted, to the north of which the structure continues for another 14 x 15 bays to rear wall which has round-arched windows; the majority of columns and roof construction here are similar in detail to those already noted; some bays rebuilt in C20. Subsidiary features: range to west alongside the River Lea, of brown brick with hipped Welsh slate roofs; two-storey east elevation of 26-window range, has raised storey band and gauged flat brick arches over doors and 12-pane sashes; similar west elevation has timber-framed carpenters' shop to the rear. History: the machine shop was the largest and most important of the new buildings erected on the Royal Small Arms site in 1854-58, the result of a movement to centralize small arms production following the poor performance of British-made guns in the early stages of the Crimean War.

This asset was previously listed twice. The duplicate record (List entry number 1249683) was removed from the List on 19 January 2019. The remaining record (List entry number 1240468) falls within the parishes of both Waltham Abbey and Enfield.