1-21 Bridge Street, Belfast, BT1 1LT

1-21 Bridge Street is a four-storey, fourteen-bay reinforced concrete framed building in the 'Festival of Britain' style, built between 1957 and 1959 to designs by the architects Young & Mackenzie for the department store firm Arnott's. It sits on the west side of Bridge Street in the centre of Belfast, within the Belfast City Centre Conservation Area. Although it is one of a small number of relatively intact modernist post-war buildings of this type surviving in Northern Ireland, it was completed eight years after the Festival of Britain itself and is not considered an outstanding example of the architecture of its period in the Province.

The building is rectangular in plan, with its principal elevation facing east onto Bridge Street, and canted corner features at each end. A return runs northward along Rosemary Street and is three storeys in height. The roof is flat, covered in bitumen felt and concealed behind a tall parapet, with cast-iron hoppers and circular downpipes to the rear.

Principal East Elevation (Bridge Street)

The ground floor is faced in polished black and green granite cladding, with black, green and white mosaic panels between the shopfronts. A deep overhanging concrete canopy runs across the full ground floor. The original geometric design and equally spaced lights to the soffit of the canopy survive at the right-hand end; the remainder of the canopy soffit has been clad in uPVC sheeting. Various sections of the canopy's leading edge support modern shop signs and short lengths of modern steel railings. The ground floor shopfronts themselves are modern, constructed of plate glass.

At first and second floor level, the central twelve bays have large multi-pane windows filling the structural bays, with ribbon glazing between green slate cladding panels. The columns projecting between bays are also clad in slate, and cill panels below the windows are likewise slate-clad. The second floor windows are surmounted by blue/green framed panels.

The third floor is stepped back behind geometric steel railings and clad in geometrically designed precast concrete and green slate units, the concrete elements being octagonal and the slate elements square. There are eighteen single square window openings set within projecting precast concrete surrounds at this level. The façade is topped by an in situ reinforced concrete parapet with a thin overhanging concrete coping.

The full-height end bays at both corners are clad in rustic brick above ground floor level. Their upper floors follow the same window and wall panel treatment as the middle section, with the addition of full glazing at third floor level set behind railings, all contained within projecting concrete surrounds. The northern canted bay has been painted and carries a large sign that obscures the wall panelling.

South Elevation (High Street)

The south elevation presents modern plate glass shop units under the canopy at ground level. The central section, approximately one and a third bays wide, has upper floors detailed to match the main east façade, with three square windows at third floor level. This is flanked by the rustic brick-clad walls of the canted corner bay. The parapet runs across the top as before.

North Elevation (Rosemary Street)

The ground floor again has modern plate glass shop units under the canopy. The original decorative soffit and lights survive on the left-hand section; the rest has been clad in uPVC sheeting. The left portion of the canopy's leading edge carries a modern shop sign; the right portion has a steel railing. Upper floor detailing on this elevation differs from the other elevations: the walling is smoothly rendered and contains five equally spaced openings at first floor level, each with a uPVC-framed glazed door with a square overlight, and five square windows above at second floor level, all set within surrounds as elsewhere. The ends are flanked by rustic brick-clad walls rising to parapet level, topped with a coping as before and with railings above and between the brick end sections. Behind the railings at third floor level is a precast concrete three-bay loggia.

Rear West Elevation

The rear elevation is partly abutted by neighbouring buildings at ground and first floor levels, and the end bay to the right is entirely obscured by an adjoining building. The exposed sections of ground and first floor are built in rustic brick with windows of various sizes and positions. Parts of the second floor are set back, creating large roof terrace areas guarded by steel tubular railings and accessed by steel stairs and ladders. Georgian wired glass rectangular rooflights illuminate the first floor rear rooms. At second floor level there are multi-pane windows set within an exposed concrete frame with brick infill panels; some of these openings have been infilled with glass blocks. The third floor is set back again, forming a long roof terrace guarded by galvanised steel railings and providing access to a series of small, narrow rooms running the full length of the building. Multi-pane replacement uPVC windows are set within the exposed concrete frame with infill panels as before. Two multi-sided timber and glazed structures described as garden rooms have been constructed on the landscaped roof terrace. A steel ladder gives access to the roof level, above which rises a tall exposed reinforced concrete framed parapet with red brick infill panels and precast concrete insets spaced at four per bay.

Windows throughout the building are steel casements in timber frames except where otherwise noted; some later replacements are uPVC. Rainwater goods are cast iron.

Setting and Context

The building stands opposite the listed Northern Whig building and the former Arnott's building at nos. 12–16 Bridge Street, both of which were designed by the same architects, Young & Mackenzie, for the same client, a few years earlier. The building does not appear on the first, second or third edition Ordnance Survey maps, indicating that the entire site was cleared — largely as a result of wartime bomb damage — prior to its construction. Bridge Street was badly blitzed during the Second World War, resulting in the destruction of a large number of buildings there and in the surrounding area; it was subsequently redeveloped at its present, considerably greater, width. Before the war the corner of Bridge Street and Rosemary Street had been occupied by a striped gabled four-storey building known as Madigan Chambers, designed by W. J. Gilliland.

Historical Occupancy

According to the Belfast Ulster Street Directory, in an earlier period the addresses that now form this site were occupied by a range of small traders including woollen drapers, a hatter, a watchmaker and jeweller, and a linen draper and haberdasher. By 1861 a substantial portion of the street — nos. 7, 9, 11, 13, 15 and 17 — was in the hands of John Arnott & Co., wholesale and retail woollen drapers, silk mercers and general warehousemen, with a wholesale entrance at no. 15. Other occupants at that time included a room paper and carpet warehouse, boot and shoe makers, woollen drapers, and a confectioner and restaurant. By 1918 the street had diversified further, with occupants including Baird Bros. boot merchants, the Irish Temperance League, a hairdresser, a publican, an athletic outfitter, ironmongers and mill furnishers, a loan company, a photographic studio, French cleaners, and a fountain pen depot.

Following construction of the present building, undated plans held in the Northern Ireland Environment Agency's Monuments and Buildings Record show the building occupied by Liptons Ltd, Stylo Shoes Ltd, John Temple Ltd, Lyttle & Co Ltd, Radio Rentals Ltd, the Ormeau Café, Savil Willfrey & Co Ltd, and Morton Newspapers Ltd. The building remains in multiple occupancy with numerous shops at ground floor level.

Background: The Festival of Britain

The Festival of Britain, which inspired the architectural style of this building, was a national exhibition that opened in London and around Britain in May 1951. Staged in the immediate aftermath of the Second World War, when much of London and many other cities — including parts of Belfast — remained in ruins, it was intended to give the British public a sense of recovery and progress and to promote higher-quality design in the rebuilding of towns and cities. It also celebrated the centenary of the Great Exhibition of 1851. The Festival was conceived by Gerald Barry and championed by Labour Deputy Leader Herbert Morrison, who described it as "a tonic for the nation."

Background: Sir John Arnott

The company that commissioned this building was founded by Sir John Arnott, 1st Baronet JP (26 July 1814 – 28 March 1898), an Irish entrepreneur who was a major figure in the commercial and political life of late 19th-century Cork. Having established a successful business in Belfast, he returned to Cork and opened a drapery store that subsequently expanded across Ireland and Britain. Among the other enterprises he founded or was involved with were Cash and Company Cork; Baldoyle and Cork Race Park Meetings; the City of Cork Steamship Company; the Passage Docks Shipbuilding Company; the Bristol Steam Navigation Company; and Arnotts Brewery Cork. He acquired both the Irish Times and The Northern Whig newspapers, though he later disposed of the Whig following disputes over its editorial policy; his family retained a connection with the paper until the 1960s. Arnott was elected Lord Mayor of Cork three times, in 1859, 1860 and 1861, and served as a Justice of the Peace for Cork City and County. He was Member of Parliament for Kinsale from 1859 to 1863, was created a Knight Bachelor by the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland in 1859, and was made a Baronet of Baily in the County of Dublin on 12 February 1896.