Description

HARWICH

TM2532NE THE QUAY 609-1/1/109 (South East side) 20/06/72 Quayside Court, including lamp standards flanking entrance (Formerly Listed as: NEW QUAY The Town Hall)

GV II

Formerly known as: Great Eastern Hotel THE QUAY. Railway hotel, later municipal offices and public conveniences (to NE), now flats and lamp standards. 1864. Built by Thomas Allom. Yellow Gault brick and render with stone dressings and low pitched Welsh slate roofs. Of 4 storeys and basements with large relatively plain rear blocks. EXTERIOR: 9-window range on NW front arranged as 3:3:3 with central 3-window range breaking slightly forward. One window range on NE and SW corner which are splayed and slightly project. 3-window range fronting Eastgate Street and one window range at NE return flank. Main elevation has central dentilled pediment with clock face in laurel wreath and adorned sea monsters with lions' heads. Attic storey of pedimented Roman cement aedicules with crayfish flanking consoles. All windows are plain double-hung sash windows with, in attic, single central glazing bars and semicircular heads. Heavy console supported cornice below attic level with frieze of floral paterae. Brickwork at corners and central projection treated as rusticated bands with courses of nailhead moulded bricks. The second-floor windows have framing pilasters with Corinthianesque capitals, some with scrollwork aprons and others with stone balconies now without balustrades. On the first floor the capitals have dolphin volutes with shell inserts and a continuous stone balcony with decorative wrought-iron handrail is supported on big stone brackets. At the corners the balcony has stone balustrade with semicircular projecting bays. Ground floor has projecting porch with stone balustrade with projecting cornice and emphatic swags. Semicircular-headed moulded and rusticated entrance arch with Gothick nook shafts and corner piers. This is fronted by stone plinths with 2 tall cast-iron lamp standards. Either side, the ground-floor elevation has 8 semicircular arch-headed windows with continuous sills and Gothick nook shafts. Above this is a series of 10 circular recesses with busts of historical personages. Heavy bulbous stone plinth and flight of steps at NE corner. A short screen wall return on NE (now public lavatories) has stone moulded cornice, 3 moulded semicircular arches with keystones on rusticated brick pilasters. The arch spandrels have shell motif and 2 projecting black disc-like ornaments over base decorative surrounds. INTERIOR: inside the porch lobby intrudes into the entrance hall which has screen of 2 squat Corinthianesque columns with wall respond pilasters. To the rear is a wide opening (now partly blocked by lift) to well staircase, with heavy soffit brackets. Stairs have cantilevered stone steps and iron loop balusters. At each landing there is a tripartite double-hung sash window with etched glass, that to the 3rd landing with semicircular head. A large ground-floor room to the NE has 4 free-standing fluted Corinthianesque columns and a large semicircular recess with arcaded glazed openings to ambulatory passage behind.

Listing NGR: TM2596532811

External Links

• Wikidata Q26483104

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