Appraisal

No. 190, Shaftesbury Avenue

Part of the symmetrical, classically detailed 1840s terrace which is visually the northern projection of Monmouth Street, northwards of the junction with Neal Street.

As with the other six properties in the terrace, no. 190 is a two-bay wide, brick-faced building. It has an angled single-bay return to Neal Street. The elevation comprises ground and two storeys and a further, attic, storey above the principal cornice and frieze. There is a sub-cornice at parapet level, with painted, moulded, stucco architraves to the subdivided sash-windows, and projecting canopies above the windows at first floor level.

The shopfront is modern and of very poor design with an inappropriate fascia.

Were the terrace less altered, this whole group would merit listing. However, even as an unlisted group with many adverse alterations at ground floor level, this unlisted terrace is of particular architectural and historic interest and considerable townscape value, contributing positively to the character, appearance significance of the Seven Dials Conservation Area.

The whole of the ground-floor frontage of this terrace would benefit from the restoration of a coherent series of classically detailed, painted-timber shopfronts.