Hms Drake Wardroom, Officers Quarters And Mess

HMS Drake Wardroom, Officers Quarters and Mess

This is a group of officer accommodation and wardroom blocks built between 1898 and 1902 at Devonport, designed by Superintendent Engineer Major Monro Wilson, RE. The building is executed in the Free Classical style and forms the centrepiece of a planned naval barracks complex.

The structure comprises a central double-depth wardroom linked by first-floor passages on two-span bridges to double-depth quarters blocks positioned at right angles to rear wings. The buildings are constructed in Plymouth limestone rock-faced ashlar to the ground floor, with dressed limestone brought to course and limestone dressings to the upper parts. Roofs are of dry slate, hipped, with stone external end stacks, axial and lateral stacks all featuring panels and moulded cornices.

The exterior is three storeys high. The main central block is slightly asymmetrical with a 1:2:1:2:1-bay arrangement, flanked by symmetrical 2:1:2-bay fronts that mirror the fronts of the rear wings. All blocks are articulated with pilasters dividing bays to the upper floors, window architraves, moulded hoods above first-floor windows, and an apron entablature at first-floor level. A moulded sill string runs to the second floor, with a moulded parapet and lower cornice above. Original horned sashes with glazing bars to the top halves and original panelled doors are retained.

The centrepiece is a tall entrance tower rising two stages above the main parapet level. This features a tetrastyle Ionic porch approached by a double L-plan staircase. Above are two central windows, then a cornice linked to the parapet cornice. The next stage displays four pilasters with a central round-arched window and entablature below an octagonal cupola with round arches and Ionic columns. Further entablature slopes inward towards a dome with a turned finial.

To the left of the tower is a staircase bay containing a tall double-transomed three-light round-arched window above a three-light flat-headed window. To the right are paired sashes, with tall sashes in the adjacent bays. The end bays are canted, featuring three-light bay windows. Other fronts have tripartite entrances and first-floor balconies with roundelled balustrades carried on moulded brackets. Below the triangular parapet pediment at each entrance bay is a tall round-arched transomed three-light stair window above a squat three-light window.

The interior is richly decorated. The wardroom contains a fine central entrance hall divided by marble columns with a large open well stair featuring moulded balusters. Decorated mess rooms flank either side, detailed with pilasters, cornices and wainscot. The rear central dining room has panelled walls and large fireplaces with painted panels. An axial corridor provides access to bedrooms on the upper floors.

This building represents the second phase of barracks construction at Devonport, built after officers had been accommodated in Howard and Seymour blocks. The complex forms part of a larger planned group and is probably the finest and most ambitious officers mess on an English barracks, executed in a bold Free Classical manner with careful attention to compositional detail and quality. It is more richly decorated than, though of similar plan form to, equivalent buildings at HMS Pembroke at Chatham and HMS Nelson at Portsmouth, and manifests the status and importance of the Royal Navy at the time.