Bridge Buildings

Block of houses, offices and shops at Bridge Buildings, Barnstaple, now entirely in office and shop use. Numbered 1–7 consecutively, the building comprises Nos 3–7 built in 1844 by the distinguished Barnstaple architect RD Gould, with Nos 1 and 2 added in 1887. The building was constructed by the Feoffees of Barnstaple Bridge both as an investment and to beautify the approach to the town from the bridge.

The structure forms a roughly L-shaped range fronting both The Square and The Strand, with the corner arranged as a broad curve. The block appears to be made up of a terrace of conventional houses; Nos 2 and 5 are each one room wide and two rooms deep with a narrow open-well staircase beside the back room. The building is three storeys high with solid rendered walls, stone balustrades, cream brick at the rear of No 1, and red brick chimneys.

The main fronts feature a 19-window range, with the six left-hand windows facing The Strand belonging to the 1887 addition. The design is uniform and Classical in character. The ground storey has horizontal channelling with pilasters at intervals. The upper storeys have pairs of giant Corinthian pilasters flanking the 1st, 6th, 10th, and 19th windows from the left. Windows at the 4th and 15th positions are three lights and form centrepieces to each of the two fronts, though the 4th window has only one light in the second storey. The centrepieces have pilasters with enriched capitals between and flanking the lights in the second storey, and panels inscribed BRIDGE BUILDINGS over those in the third storey.

Towards The Strand, the second-storey centrepiece window has a balustraded balcony on large brackets; on top of its entablature stands a patterned iron guard-rail. Towards The Square, the second-storey centrepiece window has foliated scrollwork on the frieze of its entablature and a balustrade in front of the window above. The whole front has continued moulded cills in the third storey. The top entablature features a dentilled modillioned cornice surmounted by a stone balustrade with pedestals at intervals. Over the centre of each front is a larger pedestal decorated with foliage towards The Strand and key pattern towards The Square; each carries a pair of scrolls supporting the Bridge Trust arms towards The Strand and a scallop shell towards The Square.

Ground-storey openings have been considerably altered, but original doors survive at Nos 1 and 2 and to the right of No 3. Each door has a short moulded panel at the bottom and two tall panels above, with patterned fanlights at Nos 1 and 2. Ground-storey windows at Nos 1 and 2 have three mullioned-and-transomed lights with mullions designed as slender columns with twisted shafts. The entrance to No 3 is flanked by Greek Doric columns. Upper-storey windows generally have six-paned sashes; side-lights are two-paned, and upper third-storey sashes are three-paned. In the second storey the lower sashes in the two left-hand windows are barred, except in the side-lights. The 8th and 10th windows from the left in each upper storey are blind.

A short four-window return to Maiden Street is similar in character to the main fronts. Flanking pilasters flank the right-hand window, and the ground-storey window is mullioned-and-transomed like those facing The Strand. Barred sashes appear throughout, except in the lower centre sash of the right-hand second-storey window. The second third-storey window from the left is blind. At the left-hand end, in a projecting porch, is an original three-panelled door. The rear walls of the building, visible from Maiden Street, have six and eight-paned sashes.

Interiors were partially inspected only at Nos 2 and 5. No 2 has a late nineteenth-century wooden staircase with turned balusters and newels, the newels with finials and pendants. Moulded cornices appear in the ground storey, and an enriched ceiling-band in the first floor. The ground-floor rear room has a fireplace with a bracketed shelf and cast-iron grate with tiles. No 5 retains an original wood geometrical staircase with cut strings and shaped step-ends; thin square balusters form the balustrade, which is voluted at the foot. The entrance passage has at the front a plain dado with moulded rail and skirting; at the rear a round arch with panelled soffit springing from square piers with enriched capitals (left side mutilated). The two first-floor front rooms have enriched ceiling-bands and chimneypieces with bracketed shelves.

This building is one of the earliest works of RD Gould and makes a significant contribution to this part of Barnstaple.