Cell Block (Debtors' Prison) former Her Majesty's Prison Gloucester

This is a former debtors’ prison built in 1826, designed by architect John Collingwood for the County Magistrates. It was later converted into offices in the late 20th century. The building is constructed of brick in English bond, with brick and vermiculated stone dressings.

The building is a rectangular range aligned north-south, with a single-storey projection running two-thirds of its length along the east elevation. Originally three storeys high, it now has two storeys, topped with a low-pitched 20th-century roof with projecting eaves. The ground floor features an arcade of eight bays along the side elevations and three bays at each end. The brick piers are accentuated by stone impost bands, and each bay is filled with a recessed brick panel set within a vermiculated stone cill; some panels are framed by stone jambs. Each bay contains a semi-circular brick arch with an iron-barred lunette window. A stone plat band runs around the entire building, with a raised cill band at the first-floor level supporting the prison cell windows, each framed in vermiculated stone. Similar cell windows in the end walls have been blocked. A semi-circular arched iron window with glazing bars is present in the central bay on the south end, while the corresponding bay on the north end has had its original window removed, the opening filled partially with brick, and a new opening inserted.

Inside, an archway at the south end of the ground floor retains the upper portion of a re-used Blackburn-era turnstile, featuring decorative oval detailing; the pivoting gate was removed in 2013. The archway leads to a late-20th-century staircase with iron stick balusters and a curved handrail. Although the original internal layout, with a central corridor and cells on either side, has been altered to create office space through the removal of partition walls, the central corridor remains. It is noted that the 20th-century interior fittings are not of group value.