In the 19th century stuccoing was a decorative technique, a skill in itself. Part of the Victorian tradesman’s repertoire was to make one material look like another. This principle was applied to interior surfaces too. You might have employed a master painter to paint a grain over your wooden doors, or to paint your wood so it looked like marble. What was on display was not the intrinsic qualities of the material, but the skill of the person working with them.

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Further Information

Audio Transcript for Stop 4

This spot outside Valma at number 17 Victoria Street is stop number 4 on our tour. Turn your attention back to the spot we just left, the building at number 14 – 20 Victoria Street.

There’s something unusual going on here. See the vertical line that divides the balconies and façade of the building from the side-wall? This is a clue to a building where everything is not as it seems…

At first glance this looks like an inter-war block of flats. We can see Arts and Crafts influenced features in the front façade of this building with its balconies and red brickwork and heavy use of wood, and in the bay windows down the side too. But if we look at the construction of the side-wall, it tells a different story.

The wall appears to be built from large stones and was part of a grand house dating from the 1850s. This original double story house was converted into flats in 1918 and it seems the bay windows and the front façade were added at that time. In short, a Victorian house has been hidden beneath a 1918 façade.

But that is not the end of the story. Look even more carefully at the construction. What are those walls made of? Closer inspection reveals that this is made of mock masonry. What appear at first glance to be large stones are in fact bricks covered with stucco, then ruled to look like stone.

In the 19th century stuccoing was a decorative technique, a skill in itself… Part of the Victorian tradesman’s repertoire was to make one material look like another. This principle was applied to interior surfaces too … you might have employed a master painter to paint a grain over your wooden doors, or to paint your wood so it looked like marble. What was on display was not the intrinsic qualities of the material, but the skill of the person working with them.

The arts and crafts movement, which came at the end of the Victorian period, was a revelation, because it was about celebrating the authentic qualities of the materials themselves.

Stay where you are for another minute and look at the next row of houses towards the bay, numbering down from 12 to 8, all in a row. Numbers 12 and 10 look very similar. Number 8 looks quite different. Here is another architectural mystery. All three were built at the same time and are part of the same series. The giveaway is the chimney…

Don't believe me? Let's walk down and take a closer look at number 8. Stop at the corner of Pollington Street, beside the brightly coloured figures that decorate the new high-rise apartment building.