Survey Data
Reg No
50910089
Rating
Regional
Categories of Special Interest
Architectural, Artistic
Original Use
Shop/retail outlet
In Use As
Shop/retail outlet
Date
1895 - 1915
Coordinates
315817, 233909
Date Recorded
13/11/2015
Date Updated
--/--/--
Description
Corner-sited four-storey attached commercial building, built c. 1905, presenting three bays to Wicklow Street, canted corner to junction of Wicklow Street and South William Street, and single bay to South William street. In commercial retail use. Flat roof, concealed behind balustraded granite parapet over yellow sandstone eaves course. Red brick walling, laid in Flemish bond, with pilasters to all bays, double to corner bay and to bay of side elevation; and yellow sandstone dressings, including continuous sill and stringcourses and projecting cornice to top floor sill level. Square-headed window openings, paired to middle bay of main elevation and single elsewhere, diminishing to upper floors, with yellow sandstone heads and bowtelll-moulded surrounds with timber casement windows, those to top floor having foliate carving to window heads. Two-tier canted oriel windows to bays flanking corner, each surmounted by segmental-headed pediment with carved foliate tympanum over swagged frieze, timber casement windows with stained-glass top-lights, and fluted apron. Square-headed wraparound shopfront to ground floor, flanked by marble-clad pilasters with Doric capitals rising to fluted console brackets with round-headed pediments flanking moulded cornice. Arcaded full-height display windows flanked by painted brick panels. Bottom-hinged timber casements over timber panelled stall-riser to lower part of display window to side elevation. Doorway to canted-bay flanked by fluted colonnettes, with timber glazed panelled door and top-light. Doorway to middle of main elevation flanked by similar pilasters and having granite step and glazed door.
Appraisal
A restrained, but elegant, early twentieth-century commercial building, making the corner of Wicklow and South William streets. The upper floors are characterized by regular fenestration and restrained detailing, enlivened by pilasters, simple dressings and lively two-tier canted oriels, typical of the Edwardian era, and repeated elsewhere along this stretch of Wicklow Street. The façade is enhanced by a series of original, high quality shopfronts. The detailing lends a sense of continuity in an otherwise diverse historic streetscape, and links the early twentieth-century commercial thoroughfare of Wicklow Street with the Georgian streetscape of South William Street.