General Offices, Technical/Commercial, At Vickers Ship And Engineering Limited

Shipyard office buildings dated 1872 with extensive additions of around 1900. Originally constructed for the Barrow Iron Shipbuilding Company, with later additions made for Vickers, Sons and Maxim Ltd. The building is constructed of red sandstone with ashlar dressings, and features slate and corrugated sheet roofs.

The structure forms an L-shaped range with a complex frontage to Bridge Road of three storeys plus attic on the left section, stepping up to five storeys on the right. The first floor features 10, 12 and 11 windows across its length. The left return, facing Michaelson Road, steps down to single-storey height, with five three-bay gables and a 12-bay block aligned with the road.

The Bridge Road front displays the original 1872 office and shipyard entrance, occupying the lower two storeys of the centre section and the gateway to the right. This part has a chamfered plinth and impost band, with square-headed ground-floor windows mostly fitted with plain sashes. The first floor has segmentally-arched windows, some arranged in pairs, and a corbel table. The later second floor features square-headed windows with double keystones and an ashlar entablature. The shipyard gate itself is set in a projection on the right, with iron gates and steel girder support. To the left of the gate is a roundel with rope moulding and a stag's head, inscribed 'BSBC 1872'. Above the gate are paired windows and a corbel table. This gate section sits within the five-storey element, where the fourth-floor windows have double keystones beneath an ashlar frieze. The top two storeys at the right end have been altered. The left end stack is set behind a 20th-century elevator shaft.

The left portion of the range is set back slightly and features square-headed, four-pane sashes with single keystones to the first floor and double keystones to the second. A frieze sits over the first-floor windows, with an entablature and small windows in the parapet above, along with skylights and ashlar gable copings.

The left return displays an end gable with giant pilasters, double windows to the centre bay, and a tripartite window to the attic with segmental arch, keystone and hood-mould. A three-storey gable to the left features an architraved roundel and inclined corbel tables rising to a coped gable parapet. Three single-storey gables beyond this have segmentally-arched windows beneath similar roundels and gables. The range concludes with a 12-bay shed aligned with the road, featuring a continuous chamfered sill band, large segmentally-arched windows with keystones, an oversailing course, blocks supporting the gutter, and gable copings. The end of this 12-bay shed terminates in three gables.

The Barrow Iron Shipbuilding Company was established in 1870. The office building originally fronted the shipbuilding yard with its slipways opening into Walney Channel. Contemporary plans indicate that much of the site was occupied by timber-related sheds. The company was taken over by the Naval Construction and Armaments Co Ltd in 1888, and subsequently acquired by Vickers Sons and Co in 1896 (which became Vickers, Sons and Maxim Ltd in 1897). Under this later ownership, the yard underwent massive development during a period of significant expansion in world naval construction. Much of the building likely dates from around 1900. The structures are now given over to administrative and drawing offices; those fronting Michaelson Road are included primarily for their contribution to the industrial character of the streetscape through their roadside elevations.