Full Report for Listed Buildings
Summary Description of a Listed Buildings
Date of Designation
30/12/2005
Date of Amendment
30/12/2005
Name of Property
HSBC Bank
Address
1 Lancaster Square
Location
Prominently sited on the corner of Rosemary Lane.
History
An inter-war bank shown in a photograph of 1939.
Exterior
An inter-war free-classical style single-storey bank. Walls are pale grey snecked rock-faced stone, on a plinth of larger coursed rock-faced blocks, with Bathstone freestone dressings. The steep hipped roof of graded slates is behind a freestone parapet balustrade on a moulded eaves cornice.
The splayed corner entrance has an ashlar surround. It has full-height tapering Tuscan pilasters and simpler inner pilasters to recessed double fielded-panel doors, under a keyed round arch with metal radial-glazed fanlight. The entablature has disc ornamentation over the main pilasters, and a billet frieze below the cornice. On the corner the parapet has a raised field below a shallow plain pediment.
The 3-window L side wall to Rosemary Lane has arcaded round-headed windows with keystones and linked hood mould, and steel-framed margin-lit glazing. The shorter R side wall to Lancaster Square has paired similar windows. The L-hand window has a deposit box inserted into the sill, and the R-hand window a cash dispenser at sill level. A freestone band beneath the eaves in both elevations has a superimposed modern bank sign. An attached cast-iron street sign is at the corner of the Rosemary Lane elevation.
Set slightly back at the end of the Rosemary Lane elevation is a lower 1-storey wing of snecked rock-faced stone, a hipped roof of graded slates and rock-faced stone stack. It has a 3-light mullioned and transomed window. Further L the elevation is continuous with a yard wall, which incorporates a boarded door.
Interior
The banking hall has a ceiling with plaster dentil cornice.
Reason for designation
Listed for its special architectural interest as a prominently-sited and well-preserved small inter-war bank in the free-classical style characteristic of the period, and for its contribution to the historical townscape of Lancaster Square.
Cadw : Full Report for Listed Buildings [ Records 1 of 1 ]