Description

BRISTOL

ST5872NE TELEPHONE AVENUE, Centre
901-1/16/681 (North West side)
04/03/77 Nova House
(Formerly Listed as:
TELEPHONE AVENUE, Centre
Avon House)

II

Offices. 1903. By Henry Williams. Brick with limestone
dressings, and slate mansard roof. Double-depth plan round a
central light well. Edwardian Baroque style.
2 storeys, attic and basement; 9-window range, with 3-storey
and attic rear block. The long entrance front has a raised,
rusticated basement, the upper floors articulated by banded
pilasters strips to a modillion cornice, parapet with square
section attached balusters between panelled dies, with large
ashlar dormers.
The entrance front has 2:1:1:1:3:1 windows with pilasters
between, and 1 window in the splayed left-hand corner; central
doorway has fluted half-pilasters with faceted blocks, key and
modillion pediment, plate-glass overlight and double 8-panel
doors. Windows have keyed, eared Gibbs surrounds, ground-floor
with a sill band stepped down between them and dentil
pediments, and first-floor cornices; 4 large dormers, 2:1:2:1,
as the lower windows with side consoles to the paired ones,
and later dormers set between behind the parapet.
The left-hand return has 3:3 windows, paired dormers over
each, and the left-hand section has a 3rd storey with panels
to the lintels and an inserted central doorway. Ground-floor
plate-glass windows, and plate-glass sashes above. Basement
windows have incised voussoirs. INTERIOR: wide entrance stair
hall containing a lateral stair flight with 2
quarter-landings, cantilevered stone treads and wrought-iron
railings with leaves, and semicircular-arched windows up the
stairs with stained-glass lit fron the well; doorcases have
surrounds with fluted half pilasters and fluted cornices, to
2-panel doors; the hall has a wide bow-ended half-glazed
screen with curved panes; first-floor left-hand room half
panelled with a strapwork ceiling and very good Jacobean style
1700 stone fire surround, with paired Ionic columns, paired
Corinthian columns to the overmantel, strapwork and cornices
with a central panel painted 1 E 7/ 0 AM 0; a similarly-styled
1550 stone fire surround in the ground-floor hall has an
overmantel with 3 Ionic herms, painted shields and strapwork.
HISTORICAL NOTE: The fire surrounds came from No.7 Small
Street which belonged to the Elton family. Formerly the
offices of the National Telephone Co.
(Gomme A, Jenner M and Little B: Bristol, An Architectural
History: Bristol: 1979-: 80, 389; The Buildings of England:
Pevsner N: North Somerset and Bristol: London: 1958-: 414).

Listing NGR: ST5872472827

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Armada House at Wikipedia
• Wikidata Q4792501

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Farrow & Ball How to Decorate: Transform your home with paint & paper
• 
  Cambridgeshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Devon (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Bedfordshire, Huntingdonshire, and Peterborough (Pevsner Architectural Guides): Written by Charles O'Brien, 2014 Edition, Publisher: Yale University Press [Hardcover]
• 
  Cork: City and County (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of Ireland)
• 
  Drawing up a Local Listed Building Consent Order: Historic England Advice Note 6