Survey Data

Reg No

50910126


Rating

Regional


Categories of Special Interest

Architectural, Artistic


Previous Name

Commercial Hall Co./Switzer & Co.


Original Use

Shop/retail outlet


In Use As

Shop/retail outlet


Date

1855 - 1865


Coordinates

315956, 233858


Date Recorded

30/10/2015


Date Updated

--/--/--


Description

Attached six-bay four-storey commercial block, built 1859-62, having recent shopfront to ground floor. Hipped roof to east, flat to rear (west), concealed behind rendered parapet, with replacement rainwater goods mounted on projecting replacement cornice with replacement downpipe breaking through to north elevation. Painted rendered walling with stucco dressings, including continuous stringcourse over top floor openings, and continuous sill courses to top two floors, moulded to second floor. Segmental-headed window openings to top two floors, with smaller double openings to top floor, and having raised architraves with keystones, scroll-lugs to base of top floor openings, and hood-cornices to second floor. Square-headed openings to first floor, with lugged architraves, surmounted by triangular pediments on scrolled consoles. Windows are replacement timber sliding sash, one-over-one pane to top floor, two-over-two pane to second floor, and replacement casement to first floor. Forms part of retail complex comprising Nos. 1-5 Clarendon Street, Nos. 38-44 Wicklow Street and Nos. 88-95 Grafton Street.

Appraisal

This mid-nineteenth-century commercial premises, previously known as 'Commercial Hall', was built in an Italianate style to the designs of Rawson Carroll, as the new drapery premises for Switzer, Ferguson & Son, later Switzer & Co. Successive alterations and extensions were carried out during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In 1995 the complex was remodelled for Brown Thomas department store, which included alterations to the ground floor to create a cohesive shopfront, unifying the disparate buildings within the retail complex. Despite such alterations, and some loss of historic fabric, the main façade is a focal point within the historic streetscape of Grafton Street and contributes to the rich and diverse character of the area.