History in Structure

Metropolitan Benefit Societies' Almshouses and Attached Railings

A Grade II Listed Building in Islington, London

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Coordinates

Latitude: 51.547 / 51°32'49"N

Longitude: -0.081 / 0°4'51"W

OS Eastings: 533163

OS Northings: 184869

OS Grid: TQ331848

Mapcode National: GBR HD.87T

Mapcode Global: VHGQT.KC2X

Plus Code: 9C3XGWW9+RJ

Entry Name: Metropolitan Benefit Societies' Almshouses and Attached Railings

Listing Date: 29 September 1972

Last Amended: 30 September 1994

Grade: II

Source: Historic England

Source ID: 1281174

English Heritage Legacy ID: 368542

ID on this website: 101281174

Location: Kingsland, Islington, London, N1

County: London

District: Islington

Electoral Ward/Division: Mildmay

Parish: Non Civil Parish

Built-Up Area: Islington

Traditional County: Middlesex

Lieutenancy Area (Ceremonial County): Greater London

Church of England Parish: Mildmay Grove St Jude

Church of England Diocese: London

Tagged with: Architectural structure

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Description



ISLINGTON

TQ3384NW BALL'S POND ROAD
635-1/49/55 (North side)
29/09/72 Metropolitan Benefit Societies'
Almshouses and attached railings
(Formerly Listed as:
BALL'S POND ROAD
Nos.1-12
Metropolitan Benefit Societies
Almhouses East Villa, West Villa &
Chapel)
(Formerly Listed as:
BALL'S POND ROAD
Gateway and railings of Almhouses)

II

Almshouses, originally known as the Metropolitan Benefit
Societies' Asylum. 1836 (chapel and north wing), c.1865 (west
wing), 1866 (east wing), and 1931 (rebuilding of chapel). By
S.H.Ridley. Grey brick set in Flemish bond with stone
dressings, roofs of slate. The accommodation in separate wings
on three sides of a courtyard open to the street with the
former chapel, now a hall, on the axis of the north wing; in a
Tudor style. There are two houses on either side of the chapel
and four in each of the side wings, plus East and West Villa
at the end of their respective wings, which are separately
handled. The houses are typically two storeys high and
double-fronted. Each has a porch, entered through a
Tudor-arched double-chamfered doorway with hoodmould;
flat-arched, double-chamfered two-light mullioned windows with
casements to either side. Two windows to first floor, of the
same design but with hoodmoulds having stops of carved heads
or floral ornament, the hoodmoulds linked by a moulded
cornice; parapet with modern coping. Party walls rise above a
single gabled roof and carry multiple stacks at the ridge.
Modern flat-roofed extensions at the rear of each house. West
Villa and East Villa differ in that they have four bays to the
courtyard and a two-span roof with twin gabled fronts to
Ball's Pond Road, each with a two-storey canted bay below it;
the bay has four flat-arched lights to the ground floor with
cavetto mullions and four Tudor-arched lights to the first
floor, and pinnacles to the gables with corbels and crockets.
(The plans of West Villa and East Villa have been altered so
that they no longer occupy four bays to the courtyard.)
The former chapel projects forward from the north wing,
presenting a single gabled front. Central Tudor-arched
entrance, elaborately chamfered and moulded, flanked by two
small single-light windows, with a five-light oriel window
above which has moulded corbelling, two ranges of Tudor-arched
lights, a cornice with grotesque heads which continues round
the rest of the chapel, and a band of lozenge-patterned
openwork below its roof. The gable is truncated and carries a
half-domed niche. Octagonal corner-buttresses ending in
pinnacles. Side elevations have a two-light mullioned window
each to the ground floor, and a cross window to the first
floor.
Dwarf, coped and stuccoed walls, square brick coped gate
piers, recently rebuilt, and cast-iron railing with
Tudor-Gothic finials to street.
(Historians' file, English Heritage London Division).


Listing NGR: TQ3316384869

External Links

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