17 And 19, Clare Street

BRISTOL

ST5872NE CLARE STREET, Centre 901-1/16/546 (North West side) 01/11/66 Nos.17 AND 19

GV II

Attached offices. Dated 1899. By Alfred Waterhouse. For the Prudential Assurance. Red terracotta and pink granite, ridge stack and Cornish slate hexagonal pyramidal roof. Double-depth plan. French Loire Chateau Revival style. 3 storeys, attic and basement; 4-window range. A symmetrical block to 3 sides of a corner site has drum towers with conical roofs and lead finials to the corners, a plain granite plinth with roll-mouldings under the windows, sill bands, friezes and cornices to each floor, a dentil cornice breaking forward over the window jambs, and panelled parapet. The right-hand semicircular-arched doorway has billet moulding to a chamfered reveal, in a moulded gable between large consoles with foliate faces, castellate finials to the gable, and a dated cartouche. Windows are set in raised full-height sections, paired to the centre, and narrower 2-light windows above the doorway; architraves with billet mouldings, pilaster jambs to upper floors with floriate panels and crocket capitals, and panelled aprons to the second floor; right-hand first-floor mullion and second-floor cross windows. Large 1:2:1 two-light semicircular-arched dormers with pilaster jambs, gables to the outer ones with pedimented top blocks, and large central tripartite gable with side consoles and a segmental pediment. The rear elevation is the same, and the left return is fenestrated as the central section; side and rear have plain basement openings. The towers have 3 small ground-floor windows set flat across the tower's curve, with swan's neck pediments, and single cross windows above. Plate-glass sashes. A large central stack has angle buttresses, central semicircular arches and a cornice. INTERIOR: entrance dogleg stair with foliate wrought-iron railings, and pale green moulded glazed tiled wainscot with Art Nouveau patterns and fluted reeded frieze; 6-panel doors, and eared fire surrounds with green tiles. Waterhouse was the Prudential's architect, and this is his only building in Bristol. (Gomme A, Jenner M and Little B: Bristol, An Architectural History: Bristol: 1979-: 389; Crick C: Victorian Buildings in Bristol: Bristol: 1975-: 65).

Listing NGR: ST5869672948