Royal Arsenal Former New Carriage Store Building 10

Royal Arsenal Former New Carriage Store Building 10

Carriage works, smitheries and workshops, now disused. Built 1802–1805, altered in the 19th century, with the central courtyard totally rebuilt in 1937 and 1967. The building is constructed in polychromatic stock brick with a pitched slate roof, supplemented by galvanised asbestos and outer lead-clad roofs.

The structure consists of single-depth ranges arranged around a large courtyard, with central vehicle entrances to the front (north) and rear (south) and single vehicle entrances at the middle of both side ranges.

The best-preserved section is the two-storey north range, which is symmetrical with fenestration arranged as 3:9:3:9:3:9:3 bays beneath a dentil cornice. The middle three bays are set forward and pedimented with a plat band, featuring a central round arch flanked by oculi and a square clock tower behind with an ogee roof and iron finial. The flanking sections have gauged brick round-arched ground-floor windows and segmental-arched first-floor windows, most with 6/6-pane sashes. Linking gateways have round carriage archways defined by four pilasters rising to coped parapets; the right-hand gateway contains an inserted roller blind, while the left-hand gateway has an inserted tripartite window. The outer former corner engine houses have segmental-arched ground-floor windows with blind panels above, parapets and tall lanterns.

The side and rear ranges are single-storey. The west side range follows a similar style to the corner blocks, with central entrance sections featuring a round-arched gateway flanked by parapets with sunken panels set over segmental-arched windows. The east range was largely rebuilt in the later 19th and mid-20th centuries, with only fragments of the early 19th-century building remaining. The rear (south) range was partly rebuilt but is more complete, retaining one early 19th-century entrance, though its eastern half is obscured by later extensions.

The interior formerly included a courtyard area, largely altered in the 1960s. The outer ranges contain 19th-century iron roof trusses. A notable south-central room retains a colonnaded south wall with bolting holes for line-shafting brackets attached to cast-iron columns.

The Royal Carriage Factory was founded in 1728 to produce gun carriages and mounted cannon. The building was damaged by fire in 1802, and the present structure may incorporate elements of the earlier building. It surrounded a large smithery within the courtyard. The front (north) range represents the most complete and significant surviving element of the 1802–1805 factory building. Although the eastern and southern ranges have less intrinsic interest due to later rebuilding, they are included in the listing as they form part of the courtyard plan, which defines the extent of one of the largest planned groups of engineering workshops of its period anywhere in the world. This demonstrates the scale of cannon production during the Napoleonic Wars. The internal courtyard originally comprised open avenues arranged around three parallel smitheries, each flanked by wheelers' shops, of which only fragments now survive.