Premises Of A.J. Tear And Co. Ltd. On Corner Of Dunster St. And Overstone Rd. (Former Curriers Works)

725/0/10043 DUNSTER STREET 02-DEC-03 1 Premises of A.J. Tear and Co. Ltd. on corner of Dunster St. and Overstone Rd . (former curriers works) OVERSTONE ROAD 76

GV II Former curriers works. c.1878. Red brick with slate roof, hipped to corner, and with coped end gables. Stacks to the Dunster St. gable ends. 3 storeys with 2-storey extension to Dunster St. end. V plan. Iron-framed windows to ground and first floors except wooden sashes to canted end and part of Overstone Rd. front. Very unusual wooden-framed combination of windows with glazing bars over louvred panels to top floor. Dunster St. front has a 10-window range to first floor, then 2 windows on the canted corner and 5 windows and far left taking-in door to Overstone Rd. The top floor continuous combination windows are arranged 5:1:3 along the 3 fronts. Entrance doors to canted corner and to right of Dunster St. front. Extension to right of this front may be a purpose-built engine house (1899 goad plan shows it containing a gas engine) Interior yard also has fully louvred ventilation panels to top floor. INTERIOR. Wide timber ceiling beams supporting joists. Queen strut roof trusses. The lourve opening mechanism survives in part. House/offices. Rendered and colourwashed brick. Slate roof with coped gable. 2 storeys. 3-window range at first floor of C20 windows in original openings. Ground floor has 2 windows under fascia and cornice and door within doorcase with brackets and cornice. Carriage entrance to right. HISTORY. William Collier is listed as a currier here in 1878/9 and the 1883-4 OS map shows all the ranges. In the 1890's Goulding and Co. were occupying the premises and in the early C20 the building was a leather warehouse. It has been the present bedding and upholstery factory since the 1950's. The form of ventilation for the top floor is characteristic of leather storage and drying floors before the 1890's but seldom survives. This is a fine, unusual and very little-altered example of a curriers works with the added completeness of the attached owner/manager's house. The ensemble forms part of the most significant group of boot and shoe industry buildings in Northampton. REFERENCES. English Heritage Northamptonshire Boot and Shoe Industry report, 2000, pp.10, 13 and 17, and Site Report No.51. Goad insurance plan 1899.