113 Royal Avenue, Belfast, County Antrim, BT1 1FF

113 Royal Avenue, Belfast is a Grade B2 listed building. It is a symmetrical, multi-bay, three-storey building with attic, built around 1885, with a stucco front and rusticated Portland limestone ground floor. The building is rectangular in plan and faces west onto Royal Avenue in Belfast city centre, on the east side of the street.

The steeply pitched natural slate roof features black angled ridge tiles and is fronted by a panelled stucco parapet broken at its centre by an aediculed dormer flanked by panelled pilasters supporting a segmental pediment with dentil enrichment. A moulded cornice on brackets runs along the top of the parapet. The upper floor walls are finished in stucco over a rusticated ground floor topped by a moulded cornice on a double dentil course.

Windows throughout are 1/1 timber sashes. The ground and first floor windows are round-headed; those to the ground floor sit in deep coved keyblocked surrounds with moulded stone sills and granite aprons, while first floor windows are arcaded with a continuous hood mould and foliate impost mouldings (plain to the outer openings). Second floor windows are segmental and embedded in recessed openings flanked by colonnettes, with flush cills over the second string course. The principal west-facing elevation is four windows wide to the upper floors. The ground floor has three openings, including an entrance located to the right side. The entrance comprises a multi-panelled timber door with a lugged Portland stone surround inset with a panel to the lintel bearing fixed letters 'No 11'. Above is a plain lintel cornice with a semi-circular overlight having a keystone. The dormer features paired windows.

The north side elevation is abutted by the adjoining building No. 114. The rear elevation has redbrick walls laid in English garden wall bond with gauged brick square-headed window openings and 2/2 timber sash windows. The south side elevation is abutted by the adjoining building No. 112.

The building was constructed around 1885 as shop premises. It was first shown on the fourth edition Ordnance Survey map of 1901-2, though a large-scale town plan of 1883-4 shows a gap at this location. The architect is unknown.

The building was initially occupied by Steel and Sons Ltd, jewellers, electro-plate manufacturers, gold and silversmiths, watch and clock makers, and opticians. The firm had been founded in 1860 by Matthew C Steel, joined by his sons in 1871. Having become a limited company, in 1887 the firm moved from premises in Ann Street to this building, which was named 'The Irish Electro Plate Works', electro-plating being a new undertaking in Belfast at that time. The ground floor housed a salesroom and electro-plating department to the rear, with 'balcony showrooms' on three sides of the sales floor displaying jewellery trade tools, watchglasses and materials for the watch, clock and jewellery trades. The second floor contained a showroom for clocks, particularly French and American examples, together with bronzes and electro-plated wares, where goods were also burnished by female employees. The third floor housed the watch and clock makers' workshops, part of the silversmiths' and lacquerers' plant. The top floor contained the polishers and buffers who prepared items for plating, together with the jewellers and engravers.

The enterprise failed, and by 1900 the firm was in liquidation. The building was then let floor by floor to various jewellery firms. The ground floor shop was let to John, then Thomas, Albin, wholesale and retail jewellers; the first floor to McCutcheon and Donaldson, watch and clock makers, jewellers, opticians and engravers; and the third floor to Henderson and Thompson, jewellers, silversmiths, engravers and electro-platers. The building was valued in 1900 at £311 in total.

By the early 1920s the shop had been taken over by the adjoining branch of the Northern Bank, and the ground floor shopfront was filled in and rusticated, probably to designs by Godfrey William Ferguson who is known to have completed work for the Northern Bank in Royal Avenue at around this time.

The building was extensively renovated around 2000 and is now in use as an arts centre, interconnected with No. 112. Although there has been some loss of character internally and changes to the floor plan, much historic fabric and detailing survive. The building remains a good example of smaller commercial premises representing the expansion of commerce in the city. It is located within a conservation area.