Numbers 1 To 6 And Attached Walls Piers And Railings

Terraced houses, now converted into flats, built between 1850 and 1855 on Clarendon Terrace, Brighton. Designed by Cheesemans, with George Cheeseman Junior possibly as the designer. The building was commissioned by W Percival Boxall of Belle Vue House on land purchased from Thomas Cubitt. Constructed in stucco with a roof obscured by a blocking course.

The terrace comprises six units arranged as a unified group. The main elevation displays four storeys and an attic above a basement. Numbers 2 to 5 each have four windows, while the end units—Numbers 1 and 6—have three windows on the main front and a six-window range on their respective returns. The design is orchestrated by a succession of six full-height segmental bays, one for each unit and three windows wide. This creates a complex alternation of bay and flat wall that produces a subtle rhythmic effect across the facade.

The ground floor is treated as a rusticated base, with a continuous first-floor balcony featuring cast-iron brackets and railings. An entablature with dentil cornice runs continuously above as an attic-sill band. Each attic window is framed by a continuous pilastrade with entablature. All windows are flat-arched. Those on the first and second floors are full-to-ceiling openings with architraves and individual entablatures. Second-floor windows have sills projecting on pairs of corbels. A small number of original 2/2 sash windows survive in the attic storey.

The entrances to Numbers 2 to 5 originally featured a characteristic design comprising steps leading to a door with over- and sidelights, framed by Doric attached columns and entablature with triglyph and metope frieze. When the building was converted into flats, the entrances to Numbers 2 and 5 were blocked and their aedicules filled with twentieth-century windows. The steps and landings were removed. The entrances to Numbers 3 and 4 remain intact and are paired at the party wall, sharing a single Doric column in their aedicules. The original stairs and landings were exceptionally broad, reflecting the grand scale of development in this location near Sussex Square and Lewes Crescent.

Number 1's entrance retains its original features and is set under a porch consisting of a tetrastyle Doric portico with columns coupled near the corners to provide a broad gap for the entranceway. The entablature displays triglyph and metope frieze identical to those found elsewhere. Mutules appear under the soffits of the boldly projecting cornice. The porch has a blocking course and metal roof, with side walls featuring large flat-arched openings and pilaster responds. The original entrance door has a 2/2 panelled design with bead and reel moulding.

Number 6's entrance is set under a hexastyle Doric portico with paired columns at the corners and centre. The porch plan is not rectangular; the right half is in fact a diagonal return. The original entrance, now blocked, was set in the left-hand bay and has round-arched windows with panelled dados below in each side wall.

The end and party walls of Numbers 1 and 6, and the party wall between Numbers 3 and 4, feature doubled attic pilasters. Above each attic pilaster is an antefixe finial filled with a sunburst. All repeated features—rusticated base, continuous first-floor balcony, cornicing and entablatures, and attic pilastrades—help give the group unified appearance.

The returns carry most of the treatment and features found on the main front, excepting the balcony, cornice and entablature, and attic pilastrade. To the left of Number 1's entrance rises a full-height segmental bay. Single windows to each floor in the entrance range are set in plain tripartite aedicules. Many windows in the first and second-window ranges on the returns are blocked, though some retain cast-iron window guards. The returns have 2/2 sashes of original design in the attic. To the rear of Number 1's return is a single-storey block, rusticated with entablature, with steps down to a rusticated moulded wall in front of which is a railed area with piers and walls. Number 6's return is in better repair than Number 1's. Its arrangement is similar, but the whole block sets back after the fourth-window range so that the full-height segmental bay to the right does not project beyond the wall plane to the corner.

The rear elevation displays segmental bays to Numbers 2 to 5, many with sashes of original design.

Full floor-through flats were installed in Numbers 5 and 6 during a conversion circa 1980.

The exterior features cast-iron railings to steps and very wide areas. Stacks rise from end and party walls.