1 Silver Street and 71-72 Trumpington Street, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire

Summary

1 Silver Street and 71-72 Trumpington Street, was designed and built between 1868 and 1869 by W M Fawcett as his own home with a tailors' shop at the ground floor.

Description

1 Silver Street and 71-72 Trumpington Street, was designed and built between 1868 and 1869 by W M Fawcett as his own home with a tailors' shop at the ground floor.

MATERIALS

The building is mostly built of brick, with a rendered timber-framed section to the rear. The roof is covered in plain tiles.

PLAN

The ground floor and first floors are roughly square in plan, and the upper storeys are L-shaped. The original separation of domestic and retail space survives, though residential access is now gained via Sherlock Court. The building is logically planned with accommodation facing the street while circulation and servicing is kept at the rear.

EXTERIOR

The roof form is varied with multiple ridges. This partly responds to the L-shaped roof plan. Two broad pedimented gables over sail the south elevation. Two tall dormers rise up from the bay windows of the east elevation.

The south elevation faces Silver Street. Across the pebble-dashed gables, above a moulded eaves cornice, is a continuous rail supported by metal brackets. The two principal upper storeys are walled in red brick laid in English bond. Each structural bay has a two-storey oriel bay window supported by three carved corbels that form part of the shop front at ground floor. Between the fenestration at each storey is a panel of pebble-dash render. The original domestic entrance is on the left at ground floor: a folding pair of four-panel doors with a moulded roundel for a knocker, the panels have a triangular section. The eight-paned overlight and the wooden panel to the left were once a continuous feature of the shop front (described below).

The east elevation faces Trumpington Street. Though similar to the south elevation, the oriel windows here are narrower, supported on two corbels not three, and flow into the dormers of the attic storey. On the left hand side, a 1957 Richardson Candle is attached to the red English-bond brickwork.

The Shop Front: A continuous timber fascia and cornice runs across the ground floor of the Silver Street and Trumpington Street elevations. They meet above a canted corner which forms the entrance. The doorway and square-paned overlight is framed between carved gothic braces with a dragon (left, for St Margaret?) and the arms of Queens' College (right).

There are carved corbels beneath the cornice that feature heraldic symbols associated with Queens' College and Margaret of Anjou, left-to-right: a boar's head badge; the monogram of W M Fawcett; barbels (fish); Lancastrian roses; the construction date, 1869; an eagle; alerions; French lilies; English lions; a boar's head.

On Trumpington Street the original shop front survives intact: there are brick pilasters with plinths of the same height as the wooden stallrisers, themselves interrupted by basement windows. At the top of the pilasters, above a limestone band, there are timber panels of the same height as the square-paned transom-lights. Tall rectangular panes of plate glass fill the shop windows with slender vertical glazing bars between them.

On Silver Street the arrangement has been altered. The upper parts of the pilasters have been replaced with terracotta cartouches, two with the number '1' for the address. The transom-lights and glazing bars have been removed and replaced with large single sheets of plate glass, framed beneath four-centred arches and small gothic bosses. On the left the arch crosses behind a slim retained pilaster.

The rear elevation is concealed at ground floor where it adjoins other parts of Sherlock Court. At first floor there is a late C20 door and window in a square, brick-built outshot that in-fills the otherwise L-shaped plan of the building. A slender bay of C19 gault brick in Flemish bond rises three storeys on the north side of the building. It has a small C20 window at its base, and another in the attic in a C19 opening. A blocked C19 window opening and the scar of a former adjoining roof can be seen at the second floor, above an incised stone reading 'PERMISSIVE LIGHT BELOW THIS LINE', suggesting a claim to ancient lights per the 1832 Prescription Act. Above the square outshot in the L-shaped corner of the building there are two storeys of pebble-dashed render over a timber framed wall. The fenestration is irregular, with three windows at second floor level and one in the attic.

INTERIOR

The shop interior is now a unified space but retained stub walls indicate an earlier plan form. The north wall now opens on to the former carriage arch of the adjoining Grade II listed building.

The residential parts of the building retain a high proportion of their original skirtings, cornices, doors and architraves. Many of the doors (six-panelled, three-over-three) have had later boards attached to the backs as a fire precaution.

The original domestic entrance hall has an internal porch with a secondary door that has lost the glazing originally present in its upper two panels. The pine flooring laid in a herringbone pattern has been covered with linoleum. On the west side of the hall there are two arched niches now somewhat obscured by the heating system.

The original oak staircase runs through all floors and survives intact, though coverings and metal trims have been applied to the treads, risers and nosings. The stairs have chunky chamfered newel posts and slightly elongated ball finials, closed strings, turned vase-shaped balusters, and grip handrails.

At each floor the chimney breasts remain in place and most still possess their original fireplaces. Grates remain in individual fireplaces in the basement and attic. The first and second floors were of higher status, with moulded fire surrounds and overmantels, high skirtings and moulded cornices. The two first floor rooms facing Trumpington Street originally connected by a (now blocked in-situ) set of folding doors. The attic storey is generally plain though retaining doors chimney breasts and a single fireplace.

Since 1944 basic WCs, kitchenettes and communal spaces have been introduced to each of the residential floors, as well as fire screens around the staircase. The corner room at second floor level has had an ensuite WC inserted.

The windows, particularly those facing Trumpington Street and Silver Street, have mostly been replaced with double-glazed wooden frames that replicate the original fenestration. They incorporate horizontal sliding sashes. Original glazing survives in the multi-pane leaded transom-lights of the first floor rooms, to which secondary glazing has been applied.

This list entry was subject to a Minor Amendment on 15 December 2022 to correct a typo in the text

History

Trumpington Street is one of Cambridge's principal historic thoroughfares, connecting Kings Parade and the medieval market place with a major route south. Where it connects to Silver Street an important junction is formed. Once called 'Small Bridges', Silver Street gives access to one of the few river crossings historically accessible to the public. The corner of the two streets is a notable junction, and is marked by St Botolph's parish church.

In the C19 land at the corner of these streets was owned by Queens' College. Leases relating to the site had required the best rooms or lodgings there to be reserved for the Rector of St Botolph's church. This custom was set aside in 1868 when a new lease was given to the architect W M Fawcett.

Between 1868 and 1869 Fawcett constructed a new building on the site, employing an early Domestic Revival style of architecture. The new structure incorporated some earlier fabric to the rear in the process. The ground floor was designed for commercial use and has been occupied by a succession of robemakers and tailors associated with the university; C F Carpenter was the first recorded, succeeded by James Neal and latterly Ede & Ravenscroft (as of 2022).

The upper storeys were designed by Fawcett as his own home and perhaps as a studio. He lived there until the 1890s when he and his wife Emily moved to nearby Scroope Terrace.

The building was acquired by St Catharine's College on 9 April 1944. Since that date the upper floors have been used as college accommodation, known as the Silver Street Flats. Subsequently accessed from Sherlock Court within the college, the original domestic entrance hall has been repurposed as a boiler room. Fire screens have been introduced at each floor and all of the domestic floors have had additional bathrooms, kitchens and communal areas introduced.

By the mid-1950s the geometric pargetting that originally featured on the dormers and projecting bays had been replaced with pebbledash.

In around 1957 a wall-mounted street lamp designed by Sir Albert Richardson (a 'Richardson Candle') was attached to the Trumpington Street elevation. The lamp was listed at Grade II in 2011 (NHLE 1400913).

Queens' College was established in 1448 by Margaret of Anjou, Queen of England and (nominally) France as the consort of Henry VI. Heraldic symbols associated with Queen Margaret and the College are the source of the carvings found on the corbels of the bay windows along Silver Street and Trumpington Street. St Catharine's College was established in 1473 and, alongside Queens', forms part of the University of Cambridge.

W M Fawcett (1832-1909) was a significant architect with a prolific career in Cambridge. He was County Architect from 1861 and Ely's Diocesan Surveyor from 1871. He served as Vice-President of the Royal Institute of British Architects between 1896 and 1900. Amongst Fawcett's many commissions in Cambridge are the Old Cavendish Laboratories, the Real Tennis Club, and the Master's Lodge of St Catharine's College (all Grade II, NHLE 1331808, 1422000, 1332214).

Reasons for Listing

1 Silver Street and 71-72 Trumpington Street, designed and built between 1868 and 1869 by W M Fawcett as his own home with a tailors' shop at the ground floor, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:

* It displays early characteristics of the Domestic Revival style, including the combination of domestic architectural features such as wide gables, dormer windows, and varied building materials;

* As the work of a nationally recognised and locally distinguished architect, W M Fawcett, for whom it served as both a home and a showcase of his skill and exceptional attention to detail;

* For the high quality of the shop front, including the altered Silver Street elevation, with its intricately detailed carvings.

Historic interest:

* For the long period of continuous commercial occupation by successive tailors and robemakers, particularly associated with the University of Cambridge.

Group value:

* For its relationship to the attached listed buildings (Grade II), the groups of Richardson Candles (Grade II), and the landmark structures of St Botolph's Church (Grade II) and the Pitt Building of Cambridge University Press (Grade II).

External Links

Historic England Listing

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