Clock Tower and Attached Railings is a Grade II listed building in the Brighton and Hove local planning authority area, England. First listed on 26 August 1999. Clock tower.
Clock Tower and Attached Railings
- WRENN ID
- broken-lantern-claret
- Grade
- II
- Local Planning Authority
- Brighton and Hove
- Constituency
- Brighton Pavilion MP: Siân Berry (Green)
- Country
- England
- Date first listed
- 26 August 1999
- Type
- Clock tower
- Address
- Clock Tower and Attached Railings, North Street, the City of Brighton and Hove
- OS grid reference
- TQ 308 043
- Coordinates
- 50.8237, -0.14361
- Source
- Historic England listing
Description
The Jubilee clock tower, built in 1888, is located on North Street in Brighton. It was designed by John Johnson, constructed by JT Chappell, and donated by James Willing, whose name and the date of the jubilee, 1887, are displayed on the clock face. The tower is made of Portland stone and pink polished granite, with a copper roof.
The structure is square in plan, featuring an aedicule on each of its four sides. The base is made of pink polished granite, topped with panelled Portland stone. Each front has Corinthian columns in front of pilasters of pink polished granite, which support an entablature adorned with a frieze of scrolling ornament and an open pediment. From the frieze, ships project on each side, labeled on the gunwales: 'TO HOVE' on the west, 'TO THE SEA' on the south, 'TO KEMP TOWN' on the east, and 'TO THE STATION' on the north.
The aedicule frames a round-arched panel with roundel portraits: the Princess of Wales on the west, Prince Albert on the south, the Prince of Wales on the east, and Queen Victoria on the north. Life-size female figures are seated at the corners between the aedicules.
The upper stage features blocked pilasters as quoins and banded rustication, with pendants on either side of the four clock faces. It has a frieze of balusters, a dentil and modillion cornice, and an octagonal roof. The roof displays cartouches between putti on all four sides, with lucarnes above and urns at the corners. The domed copper roof is topped with a crown that carries a metal globe at the foot of a mast. Originally, this was a time ball designed by Magnus Volk, which rose and fell on the hour but was discontinued after a few years due to noise complaints. A weather vane with the initials JW is also present.
Iron railings with scrolled panels and urn and spearhead finials are attached to the clock tower on the north and east sides, and they also frame the entrances to public lavatories.
Local climate
Clock Tower and Attached Railings receives an average of 840 mm of rain a year. This makes it wetter than 56% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is greater than that of 89% of listed buildings.
It experiences an average of 15 freeze-thaw cycles a year, fewer than 85% of listed buildings. Of these, 7 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.
Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.
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- Detailed attributes — period, style, materials, features
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