Description

Archibald Simpson, 1839. 3-storey, 4-bay classical tenement with shops to ground. Grey granite ashlar. Banded rustication to ground street elevation. Blocking course with central consoled wallhead panel. Architraves and cornices to windows. Cill courses. Central entrance door flanked by plate glass shop fronts with timber stallrisers and fanlight-style glazing pattern to upper lights. To far left, segmental arched doorway with timber door with coloured glass sidelights.

Timber plate glass sash and case windows to upper storeys.

INTERIOR: Modernised and altered offices to upper storeys (2006). Shop to right with central segmental archway supported by 2 Corinthian columns. Dentilled cornicing.

Statement of Interest

Originally built for the Scottish Fire and Life Assurance Society, this building is an integral part of the designed streetscape of King Street. The clean lines and classical proportions offer an elegance and grandeur to the street, which was entirely appropriate to the emerging wealthy early nineteenth city of Aberdeen. A print of 1840 shows that the ground floor was originally composed of 4 arched openings. The arcading is echoed in the glazing pattern.

This building was built in 1839, and retains the simple linear classical form. The loss of the arcaded ground floor has not diminished its quality in the streetscape.

King Street developed after 1794, when a town council meeting asked the engineer Charles Abercrombie to find a way to connect the original steep, muddled Medieval streets of Aberdeen to the surrounding countryside. His plan was for two streets, one of which would run from Castlegate to the Denburn and the other which would run from the Castlegate to the North of the town. The latter was King Street. A competition for designs for this new street brought forward a design from Thomas Fletcher. This was to be a long classical façade, with a pedimented centrepiece and this design was begun on the East side in 1805. The idea of a standard, uniform terrace, however, was abandoned when negotiations had to be entered into with owners regarding the length of the frontages and the heights of the buildings. The West side, on which this building is situated was to have followed a similar, uniform design, but again, this was abandoned to a more diverse collection of frontages, all within the classical style.

Part of B Group with 5 Castle Street, Nos 1-56 (inclusive nos) King Street including St Andrews Episcopal Cathedral.

The following were reference used in the previous list description. Contracts. Aberdeen Journal April 10th 1839. (for North of Scotland Fire and Life). G.M. Fraser Archibald Simpson and his Times

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Wikidata Q17775182

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

• 
  Sussex: East with Brighton and Hove (Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  [(Cumberland and Westmorland)] [By (author) Nikolaus Pevsner] published on (January, 1967)
• 
  Surrey (The Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Georgian Style and Design for Contemporary Living
• 
  For the Record
• 
  Pevsner's Architectural Glossary (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Introductions)