Numbers 3 And 4 And Attached Railings And Piers

Numbers 3 and 4 are semi-detached houses located on Montpelier Villas in Brighton, built around 1845. They are constructed of stucco with a slate roof and feature two storeys above a raised basement. The houses have a two-window range facing Montpelier Villas and a four-window range on the return side. Each house is wider at the back, with the entrance situated in the resulting angle, and the front and back sections have separate roofs.

The front elevation is characterized by banded rustication on the ground floor and long and short quoins on the first floor. There are steps leading up to a flat-arched entrance flanked by pilasters and consoles, which support a first-floor balcony with a scalloped balustrade. The entrance has an overlight, and the basement and ground floor feature a segmental bay with flat-arched triple windows, topped by a shallow dome above the storey band. The basement windows have original 6/6 sash designs, while the ground-floor windows have bracketed balconies with cast-iron railings and a fringed canopy above. The first-floor windows are flat-arched with margin lights, although the westernmost first-floor window on the return side is blank.

At the back, there is a full-height segmental bay with tripartite windows and margin lights for the first-floor sashes, and the easternmost first-floor window on each house is also blank. The eaves are supported by console brackets with paterae in the frieze, and the hipped roof has central and additional stacks. An extra storey has been added to the rear of No. 4.

The entrance steps and front gardens are enclosed by cast-iron railings, which feature brackets, and there are square, stuccoed, corniced piers between each pair of houses. The 20 houses that make up Montpelier Villas share a uniform design, making these semi-detached houses a rare example in Brighton. The railings were listed separately on August 20, 1971.