Headquarters Royal School For Military Engineers And Attached Basement Area Railings, Brompton Barracks

TQ 7669 SW GILLINGHAM PASLEY POAD (east side), Brompton

3/29 HQ R.S.M.E. & attached basement area railings, Brompton Barracks

GV II

Institute, now offices. 1872-4, by Sir Frederick Ommanney. Yellow brick with Doulton terracotta and Portland stone dressings, ashlar axial stacks and slate roof Italianate style. Lateral H-plan with axial corridors. EXTERIOR: 2 storeys, attic and basement; 2:7:5:7:2-bay range. A symmetrical front with plinth and modillion eaves cornice, end and central sections set forward with ground-floor banded rustication to a moulded plat band, first-floor with clasping rusticated pilaster strips to a frieze with enriched metopes and consoles to a modillion cornice and balustrade with panelled dies; round-arched ground-floor windows with moulded heads linked by an impost band, and architraves and cill blocks to segmental-arched first-floor openings. Central section has full-width steps up to a 3-bay centre with 3 doorways with keyed architraves and double half-glazed doors, the first-floor recessed behind an open loggia of Corinthian columns, paired to the middle with cast-iron railings of diagonal bars to a central round. Keyed architraves to plate-glass sashes. Rear has similar articulation in 5 sections, with a raised roof to the central block between the parallel front and rear ranges. INTERIOR,: large entrance hall divided by distyle in antis paired Ionic columns with rear round-arched recessed arcade, impost band and dental cornice; an axial corridor leads to open dogleg stair each side with ornate cast-iron balusters and a moulded rail. Central sunken library remodelled mid C20. SUBSIDIARY FEATURES: attached cast-iron basement area railings extend from the central steps to the outer comes. HISTOPY: Built as the home of the School for Military Engineers, following the Commission on Military Education in 1869. The central lecture room was flanked by specialist teaching sections. Placed on the symmetrical axis of the War memorials and the quadrangle of the Mess blocks to the W (Central Ave) qqv). Included for historic interest and as part of the Brompton barracks, and for its architectural interest displaying an early use of revived terracotta. (Papers of the Royal Engineers: Marsh Major: Description of the PE Institute, Chatham: Chatham: 1874-: 73).

Listing NGR: TQ7635168979