3, Fairfax Place

No. 3 Fairfax Place is a shop with domestic accommodation above, dated 1880 and built for RC Cranford. It features a mix of construction materials including stone, brick, and timber framing, topped with a slate roof that has pierced crested ridge tiles. The building has panelled chimney shafts made of red and yellow brick over slate-hung bases for the front axial and rear gable end stacks.

The exterior consists of three storeys and an attic, displaying a symmetrical three-bay front. There is a fourth bay that is canted at the left corner and another bay that returns to Smith Street. The front is elaborately timber-framed and jettied. To the right, the stone party wall features limestone ashlar corbels and a datestone carved with the years 1620 and 1880 at the first-floor level. The ground-floor shop front is a 20th-century replacement, while the canted corner is supported by cast-iron columns with ornamental capitals. The original structure remains intact, with each floor jettied and shaped joist ends projecting through a moulded timber cornice.

The centre bay on the front breaks forward at the second-floor level, topped with a gabled dormer. The windows include one-, two-, and three-light mullion-and-transom designs. The first-floor lower panels are decorated with Jacobean-style pargetting, while the second-floor panels below the windows feature criss-cross bracing, with other panels hung with decorative slates in two colours. The gables are adorned with bargeboards and elaborate wrought-iron finials. The top lights of the first- and second-floor windows have patterns of coloured leaded glass.

The rear section of the building on the Smith Street return is constructed from snecked grey limestone with red and yellow brick dressings and consists of a one-window section. The windows here are simpler versions of those on the front, all set under low segmental arches. The second-floor window projects forward on a moulded base and rises through the eaves to a gabled half dormer. There is a door to the left under a cranked arch. The interior has not been inspected but is expected to be of interest. Nos. 1-3 Fairfax Place were built together, featuring a unified symmetrical frontage in a lavishly decorated Tudor style.