Brig Street Tenements

The Brig Street Tenements are a tenement block built between 1881 and 1884 by the architectural firm Paley and Austin of Lancaster, with main contractors Smith and Caird of Dundee. This four-storey building is constructed of red brick and features graduated slate roofs. It has a near-symmetrical façade with 2:14:2 bays and a slightly-recessed center. The windows are arranged in alternating pairs and singles, with 4/2-pane sashes.

The ground floor has a chamfered plinth, and the windows feature flush sills and triple-header segmental arches. The first floor mirrors this design but includes projecting sills. A patterned brick band runs below the second floor in the center and the third floor of the outer bays, while the second-floor windows interrupt a moulded string course. The third floor is treated as an attic storey, featuring hipped-roof dormers within a mansard roof, while the end bays rise to four full storeys and have hipped roofs.

Additional architectural details include a string course and a terracotta corbel table supporting cast-iron ogee gutters, along with projecting lateral stacks on each return and plain ridge stacks on the party walls. The rear of the building, facing Brig Street, also consists of four full storeys across the entire range. There are nine staircases with half-landing balconies, iron railings, and round arches above. Utility wings feature casements in previously unglazed apertures and have hipped roofs.

These tenements were part of a significant development intended to house workers from the Barrow Iron Shipbuilding Company and are one of four identical blocks located behind the sandstone Devonshire Buildings on Michaelson Road. The site is bordered by more elaborate brick tenements that back onto Sloop Street and Steamer Street. This building is a well-preserved example of a type that is rare in England.