Barratt Shoe Factory

This is a shoe and boot factory, with a front range dated 1913 facing Kingsthorpe Road. Designed by Macvicar Anderson for Barratt’s Shoes, the front building exhibits an exuberant Neo-Baroque style. Constructed of stone, brick, and terracotta with a steel frame, it rises three storeys. The symmetrical front elevation features nine bays defined by full-height pilaster buttresses. A stone plinth grounds the building. A central doorway is framed by a projecting porch with a broken segmental pediment supported by Roman Ionic columns and a deep entablature with carved frieze blocks. Large arched openings, housing metal framed three-light mullion and transom windows, flank the doorway, except for the end bay on the left, which features a cart entry under a similar arch with a fanlight grille of radiating metal bars. Stone spandrels above the arches are divided by raised key blocks. The first and second floor bays are subdivided by an intermediate pier. Pilaster buttresses and piers are decorated with alternating bands of brick and stone. Metal frame casement windows with transoms are present on the first floor, with stone spandrels above, and carved aprons. Lower windows on the second floor are found except for the bays either side of the central bay. These have tall windows topped by stone segmental pedimented features with boldly moulded wreaths enclosing inscriptions: "Estd" on the left and “Built” on the right. Similar 1903 1913 pedimented features crown each end bay, enclosing a circular window in a wreathed frame with side drops. A dentil eaves cornice, crowned by balustrades of open stone letters – "FOOTSHAPE" to the left and "BOOT WORKS" to the right – runs along the top. A circular clock is set within a segmental headed frame above the central bay. The original boundary was marked by stone and brick gate piers and a brick and stone capped plinth for a former boundary railing. The large factory extension to the rear of the front section is not of special architectural interest.