Royal Bank Of Scotland

This free-standing bank building occupies a sloping island site, with each elevation given architectural consideration. The plan form is an open E-shape. The character is civic and ceremonial to the front, defensive and military to the rear.

The building has a reinforced concrete frame largely clad in Portland stone, Dartmoor granite, and High Broom hand-made facing bricks. The attic storey is clad in patinated copper, and most windows and doors are bronze. The windows open on a horizontal pivot.

Principal West Elevation

The main elevation facing Royal Parade is five storeys plus a set-back attic storey, fifteen bays wide. A large, deeply recessed flat-headed portico of four storeys frames the central section, where eleven bays are reduced to seven. Six slender granite columns—rectangular in plan and without ornament—support the portico. These columns are connected at second-floor level by a continuous open balcony with railings, and have concealed lighting built into their rear faces.

Above ground-floor level, the recessed windows are laid in a rigid grid around the portico, contained within the joint lines of the Portland stone cladding. The ground-floor windows are double-height: those at the front of the portico light the banking hall, those to the sides light the stair lobbies.

The rear wall of the portico is decorated with turquoise mosaic heightened with lilac and enlivened by gold devices drawn from the histories of both the National Provincial Bank and Plymouth. The mosaic has been repaired in places. Two symmetrically placed entrances to the banking hall have door frames of white marble containing bronze double doors, each with ten decorative roundels depicting ancient and modern coins. A plaque on the north wall credits the builder. Granite planters with fluted fronts are incorporated beneath the windows on either side of the portico.

The attic storey is a shallow barrel-vaulted structure of nine bays with square windows. From its centre rises an illuminated clock tower of copper-sheathed steel with blue glass panels, surmounted by an access platform with bronze balustrade and flag-pole in the manner of a look-out or crow's nest.

Rear Elevation

The rear elevation is six storeys plus attic. The basement storey and machine room with replacement glazing above act as a podium for the recessed upper storeys of the central façade and link the flanking stair towers. The basement storey originally consisted of a loggia with granite columns, now filled with brick. The stair towers project to enclose the central façade and create an open balcony with railings above the machine room.

The fenestration pattern differs from the front. The central façade has rectangular windows that break through the joint lines. The windows lighting the banking hall are double-height. Each six-storey stair tower has a Portland stone frame with walls clad in hand-made buff-coloured brick. The north tower is pierced by a rigid symmetrical pattern of small square windows—four to each storey—within Portland stone frames. The brickwork of the south tower, which contains toilets, is left blind. The Portland stone inner return of each tower contains a single window elongated over four storeys. Each tower is terminated by a set-back tile-clad service storey with rounded corners. The attic storey, which may originally have been open to the rear, is glazed along its entire length between squat tile-clad columns.

End Elevations

Both end elevations are five storeys plus attic, clad in Dartmoor granite, with large rectangular windows to the ground floor and smaller rectangular windows to the four storeys above. The granite cladding projects to form a framed edge to the building's principal elevations. At the centre of each elevation is a vertical row of windows separated by panels in which the granite is machine-carved in vertical strips. The south elevation has a second vertical row of windows to the right.

The ground floors have projecting single-storey flat-roofed pavilions, the roofs of which are concave to their leading edge and supported by sturdy piers of roughly hewn Dartmoor granite. The south pavilion housed the manager's office. The north pavilion was the entrance hall for tenants occupying office space on the upper floors, and has glazed side-screens of sandblasted glass with cast emblems representing the National Provincial Bank (the 18th-century Bishop's Gate, the Bank's headquarters having been at Bishopsgate in London) and Plymouth. The entrance retains its original bronze doors with replacement handles. Curved granite steps with new handrails lie before the entrance. There are planters beneath the windows on both end elevations, as on the west front.

Interior

The building's principal space, the banking hall, originally rose through two storeys fronted by the western portico and was entered directly through the paired doors. Suspended ceilings have now been inserted throughout, and the area has been subdivided vertically by partitions. New cladding materials obscure the teak floors, the walls—the contemporary press reported that the north and south walls were lined with Serpeggiante marble—and the short marble columns which marked the south end of the hall. However, it is thought that these features survive, and the original banking desk may also survive beneath later cladding.

The double-height tenants' entrance hall survives as originally designed, though some more recent furnishings and fittings have been installed. The walls are lined with polished travertine limestone. The lower portion of the eastern wall, with openings for the stair and lifts, is of Derby Dene limestone carved with vertical strips. The entrance hall is overlooked by a three-sided gallery, angled above the entrance, with a bronze balustrade. This gallery now gives access to the inserted mezzanine floor—an opening having been cut at this end and to the south—as well as to the stair and lifts. Two engaged marble columns on the south wall echo those originally visible in the banking hall. The travertine floor noted in the contemporary press is now obscured by carpet.

The stair is of terrazzo inset with non-slip cubes, with a bronze wedge-shaped handrail. The southern stair has a terrazzo dado with plaster above, and the handrail is of aluminium.

The two floors above the banking hall were originally open, with the intention that they could be divided into offices as required. The original first floor—now referred to as the third floor—remains open, with a line of square columns relating to those of the portico outside. The columns and walls have later cladding, and there is a false ceiling. The windows to the west give onto the balcony in the top part of the portico; the two doorways which originally provided access have been partially blocked for conversion to windows.

The original second floor, now referred to as the fourth floor, also remains open-plan with original timber fittings, including facings to the columns, doors and door surrounds, and glazed screens. At the north end of this floor, a bronze tablet commemorates members of the National Provincial Bank who served in the First World War. The tablet was recovered from the bank's former premises in Bedford Street.

The top floor, originally intended as a flat, is now an open office with a timber-faced extension along the east side. It is thought that small rooms at the north and south ends of the building do not retain original features. The clock lantern and the chamber beneath it contain the original clock with its working machinery.

Subsidiary Features

The contemporary railings to the rear car park are set in dwarf walls of Dartmoor granite, stepped to accommodate the rising ground to the north. They consist of rectangular panels with rounded corners separated by piers.