Northwood Police Station Including Police Lamp, Call Box, Boundary Fence and Gates, Northwood, London

Description

804/0/10089 MURRAY ROAD
31-OCT-08 2
NORTHWOOD POLICE STATION INCLUDING
POLICE LAMP, CALL BOX, BOUNDARY FENCE
AND GATES

II

Police Station, 1910, by John Dixon Butler. Minor later alterations.

EXTERIOR: red brick building in an Old English style with half-timbered elevations, steep-pitched tile roofs with gabled dormers, tall brick chimneys and stone dressings. Its prominent corner site has permitted two elevations of architectural quality, to the north and east, whereas the rear is more functional. The elevation to the east has a central stone porch, six-light mullion and transom window to the right and two casement windows above in half-timbered dormers breaking through the overhanging eaves. The single-storey cell block runs to the left of this elevation and the return is the principal elevation to the north. The latter is half-timbered with three projecting gable ends, one slightly jettied with a polygonal bay window with stone surrounds on the ground floor. The half-timbering is varied, including curved braces, and the use of multiple roof pitches, tall chimneys, and variety of fenestration creates an organic appearance. There is a Tudor-arched doorway, with recessed porch, in the centre of the elevation and the irregularly placed windows are casements with timber mullions, some also with transoms, on the upper storeys and timber sashes at ground floor. The timber-framing and window arrangement continues on the western return, where it is terminated by a broad brick chimney stack. The rear, which enclosed a small yard, is more municipal, and has hipped tile roofs and timber sashes with rubbed red brick arches. As is characteristic of Dixon Butler's stations, the craftsmanship of the building, in particular the brickwork, is good throughout. The original doors and window joinery survive in all the original openings as does the original timber boundary fence. Other features of note include the police lamp and a police call box of the 1930s, both located near the entrance to the station from Murray Road.

INTERIOR: the reception area, accessed via the original wood front door and glazed vestibule screen, remains largely as built with its terrazzo floor and polished wood desk (although both have experienced some modern alterations). The large office space with its bay window remains undivided and a passage leads through to the staircase with timber handrail and metal balustrade. Upstairs are a number of small rooms with no original fireplaces and little historic joinery. Abutting the rear of the building is the single-storey cell block where the small windows high in the walls survive, but not the subdivision of the space into individual cells; this may have always been a communal cell.

SUBSIDIARY FEATURES: Police lamp and police call box. The latter is a narrow rectangular cast iron post, painted blue, with arched head surmounted by a circular glass lens mounted in a finial, in which a (modern) telephone is placed. The item is identified with a panel reading 'Police Public Call Post', above which is cast the initials MP to each side of a crown. Panels on the other sides read the same, or just 'Police'. The two timber gates and boundary fence with chamfered posts, in a simple Arts and Crafts-style design, are contemporary with the police station and contribute to its setting.

HISTORY: John Dixon Butler, a Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects, was architect and surveyor to the Metropolitan Police a post to which he succeeded his father, John Butler, in 1895 and served in until his death in 1920, by which time he had designed over 200 police stations and courts. His period as surveyor is notable for the architectural quality of his designs. Dixon Butler stations are usually in a domestic style, sensitive to the context of newly-developed suburban areas in which stations were often located, but with strong municipal qualities such as handsome iron railings, inscribed lintels identifying the building as a police station, and other stone dressings. Northwood is a notable example of the architect's versatility, and at few other stations did Dixon Butler respond so sensitively to the grain of the previous development of the area (which had expanded rapidly following the arrival of the Metropolitan Railway in 1887) and the rural origins of the former Middlesex village, which would still have been in living memory in the Edwardian period. The Old English style adopted by Dixon Butler is rare in a Metropolitan Police Station, and seems to have been reserved for stations on the far-flung reaches of the Metropolitan Line (Pinner Station is another example) or places with a particularly bucolic temperament, such as Kew.

The Metropolitan Police Force Surveyorship was established in 1842, thirteen years after Sir Robert Peel's Metropolitan Police Act of 1829. From the first purpose-built police station in 1831, at Bow Street, new stations were built throughout the C19, particularly in the late 1880s following the political unrest of that decade and high-profile events such as the Whitechapel Murders. Victorian police stations were hence built in prominent positions with easy access from the street, in order to advertise the presence of the police to a concerned public. Design often responded to political and social concerns, in the 1880s, for example, following a diphtheria case in Rotherhithe police station, the separate accommodation of police officers and prisoners was recommended. This was then overturned in the 1890s when a volatile police demonstration occurred at Bow Street after which it was thought wise to house constables within the stations, and hence under the supervision of on-duty officers. By the time of Dixon Butler's surveyorship a formula had been established: stations were designed with a mixture of police accommodation and cells; separate access for the police, prisoners and public was provided; and thought was given to the well-being of prisoners.

REASONS FOR DESIGNATION: Northwood Police Station is listed for the following principal reasons:
* special architectural interest as a notable example of a police station by John Dixon-Butler in an Old English style, a response to the particularities of the location;
* the style is subtly expressed and the building is equal in architectural quality to the best of the domestic suburban development with which it sought to be in keeping;
* good state of preservation with interior and subsidiary features of interest including front doors, vestibule screen, front desk, staircase, police lamp and 1930s police call box.

Reasons for Listing

Northwood Police Station is deswignated for the following principal reasons:

* special architectural interest as a notable example of a police station by John Dixon Butler in an Old English style, a response to the particularities of the location;
* the style is subtly expressed and the building is equal in architectural quality to the best of the domestic suburban development with which it sought to be in keeping;
* good state of preservation with interior and subsidiary features of interest including front doors, vestibule screen, front desk, staircase, police lamp and 1930s police call box.

External Links

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