Appraisal

No. 1 Earlham Street

Including the return elevation of nos 144-148 Shaftesbury Avenue, no. 1, Earlham Street has a prominent polygonal bay at the corner at the junction with Shaftesbury Avenue, with a five-bay, four-storey elevation to Earlham Street. It was designed in 1889 by Richard M. Roe and G. Richards Julian (of no. 62, Basinghall Street, London, E.C.) for Zaensdorfs, the bookbinders.

It is built in red brick with richly detailed Portland Stone dressings at the corner. It has a carved plaque above the entrance and plainer stone dressings along the street, with interesting cast-iron lintels to the window openings of the upper floors. The original openings survive at ground floor level on both street frontages, with window joinery of traditional character in four of the openings on the Earlham Street frontage – the fifth, with black metal framing and a distinctive 3-D street numbering sign, serves the upper floors. The street elevations have benefitted from cleaning in recent years. The Earlham Street elevation has a Covent Garden Lantern

An unlisted building of both particular architectural interest and considerable townscape value contributing positively to the character, appearance and significance of the Seven Dials Conservation Area.

Poorly designed internally-illuminated double sided projecting signs on each street elevation and at the corner should be removed and replaced with well designed double sided projecting hanging signs. Regrettably, the window joinery in the ground floor openings has been painted white. This should be re-painted in an appropriate colour.