Abbey Chambers

Abbey Chambers is a bank, now offices, built in the 1883 and reportedly completed in 1897. Later altered in 1924, it is located on Clare Street in Bristol. The building was designed by Frederick Mew and subsequently modified by RM Drake and Benjamin Wakefield. Constructed from limestone ashlar with carboniferous limestone doorways and brick and limestone cross-axial stacks, it sits on a double-depth plan accommodating a wedge-shaped site. The style is eclectic, drawing from Italian Renaissance Revival influences.

The building is three storeys high with an attic, and features an 8-window front and a similar rear elevation on Baldwin Street. A prominent, pedimented 5-window section projects forward, separated from an adjacent 3-window section by square pilasters that extend through the ground-floor fascia and cornice to a modillion cornice. The ground-floor pilasters are banded, with fluted necks and acanthus capitals, and are plain above, culminating in small segmental pediments over lion heads, fluted necks, and carved head consoles. A large, ornate doorway is topped by Assyrian sphinxes and a swan's neck pediment, with brackets supporting a fluted frieze and a pediment derived from the cornice, and including acroteria. Name panels are set into the door jambs. Modern shop fronts now occupy the ground floor. The upper floors are articulated by attached Corinthian columns on the right and pilasters on the left, with fluted necks. First-floor windows have pilaster jambs and entablature lintels, while console pilasters support pediments over the three windows above the doorway and in the middle of the wing. The second floor features pilaster jambs. Modern plate-glass windows are fitted throughout. A frieze incorporates sunken roundels within wreaths with acroteria above a shallow pediment, topped by a low parapet and a central stack with a segmental pediment. The rear elevation has a 7-window range, with carboniferous limestone doorways at each end and modern shop fronts. The doorways have banded, ovolo surrounds, consoles to shallow pediments, and rectangular lights above. Upper floors are similar to the Clare Street facade, with alternate narrow windows with pilaster jambs and pedimented windows, plus second-floor pilaster jambs. Wreaths decorate the entablature, which is dated 1883 to reflect different phases of construction, with additional dates of 1855 and 1925. A balustrade runs over the windows.

The interior was refurbished in 1992.