Description

This list entry was subject to a Minor Amendment on 27/01/2020

TL5438
669-1/2/141

SAFFRON WALDEN
EAST STREET (North side)
Constable Place, Nos 5-7 (cons)
Former Police Station including area railings, gateway and walls

(Formerly listed as Police Station including area railings, gateway and walls, EAST STREET)

II
Police station. Dated 1884 completed 1886. Red brick, English bond in Elizabethan style with stone dressings, front and side elevations partly decorated with burnt headers in diaper pattern, timber framing and plaster in some gables, clay tile roofs with crested ridge tiles. Two storey, prominent stacks and cornice between floors. Plan approximately rectangular with short rear, end cross-wings. First floor loft extension over and beyond carriageway at west end and now supported by larger rectangular C20 ground floor building.

South front elevation: slightly asymmetrical composition of long range with off centre front doorway set in porch and twin facade-gabled two window range that also breaks forward from main block. Porch, pedimented with broad moulded architrave, pedimented shield above (Essex and Saffron Walden), with support wall shaped up as Dutch gable. Doorway round headed, leaf decorated spandrels and 1884 date, fully glazed with inner glass door. Windows of facade all segment headed with gauged brick voussoirs, casements of cross type with lower additional glazing bar. Central unit has four ground floor and two larger first floor window beneath gables. To west, simple three-light ground floor window, to east, doorway in similar style plastered, under segment head and with side lights. Door has 2 x 2 panes upper glazing. To east, three-light window as at west end. First floor, two-light window over doorway. Large stack with brick corbelled cornice at east end over crow-stepped gable end. Similar stack towards west end and two further stacks central, behind roof apex.

To west, tile-hung loft with crested roof tiles and weather vane at west, set well back over simple wooden arched carriageway. Two-leaved boarded door. C20 projecting flat roofed red brick block supports west end of loft and has two two-light C20 casement windows.

West end elevation: gable of street range to south with cornice continued. Two further facade gables adjacent at north with timber, plaster and tile hanging, each with a cross window. Two prominent stacks, one each to front range and end wing. Central deep flush segment headed porch with internal steps and inner arched doorway, cross window each side. To north, gable end of deep tile-hung loft, simple single light window, below, C20 block has small rear extension and 3 casement windows.

East end elevation: crow stepped gable of street range has large external stack with cornice continued. Single light window above each side of stack. To north, wing, two-window range, cross style but only single window on first floor under projecting tile hung dormer gable. Large stack seen on north gable apex and another behind roof apex. Side of ground floor lean-to porch at north end.

Rear: north elevation: principal range and end wings with loft at west end. Three intermediate facade gables between wings, inset at west end. Large stacks to each wing and three intermediate behind gables. First floor windows irregular grouping of cross and single light type. Ground floor has central rail-guarded cell windows and plain door in inset bay. East wing gable wall has hip roofed porch, two inner doors with four panels, one with upper glazing. West wing gable wall, one of two originally cross windows now blocked. Loft room has central framed and boarded two-leaf door and adjacent four-paned window.

INTERIOR: not inspected.

WALL AND RAILINGS: the frontage has wrought-iron square section spear top railings set on a red brick dwarf wall with stone shaped coping. Railings and central two-leaved gateway decorated with restrained scrolls and leaves. Wall continues each side in front of garden to east, interrupted to west, fronting court. Brick piers have roll moulded arrises and stone caps.

Listing NGR: TL5406938479

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26585302

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

• 
  ENGLAND GUIDE TO POST WAR LISTED: A Guide to Post-war Listed Buildings
• 
  Derbyshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Kent: West and the Weald: The Buildings of England (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  London 6: Westminster (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England): Westminster v. 6
• 
  London 3: North West: North West v. 3 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Berkshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)