Mobbs Miller House Including Front Walls, Railings And Gates

Mobbs Miller House, including the front walls, railings, and gates, is a boot and shoe factory built between 1922 and 1925 by the in-house architect L.G. Elkins for the Co-operative Wholesale Society Ltd. The building features red brick with a darker brown brick center block and stone dressings, all in an early Georgian style with parapeted roofs. It is two stories tall, with a small part having an attic, and includes north-light sheds at the rear behind two adjoining ranges that face Christchurch Road and Ardington Road, forming a square plan.

The front of the building has long, two-story ranges of windows, featuring 8/8 sashes above 12/12 sashes, which alternate with giant rusticated pilasters topped with stone capitals. The main entrance is highlighted by a columned frontispiece with a Venetian window above, set within an aedicule that has a shallow open pediment. Above this, there is a stone attic. The three ground floor windows on either side of the entrance have round-arched heads with elaborate rusticated surrounds. The side entrance on Ardington Road features a three-story range of four windows, also with giant pilasters, and the windows are linked vertically by brackets and stone aprons. Low walls with ornamental iron railings and gates run along the front of the building.

Historically, the factory was used by the Co-operative Wholesale Society until it was acquired by Mobbs Miller in 1969, after which it produced plastic unit soles and plastic heels until the 1980s. This factory represents the last significant construction in the boot and shoe industry, built during a time when the industry was in decline, yet it was designed to fit seamlessly into a suburban environment near Abington Park, with its detailed facades resembling those of municipal offices or educational institutions.