Building record 7198/0/68 - Leather works, Regent Street / Crown Street

A single storey leather works on the south side of Regent Street. The building is constructed of brick with a tile covered roof. Ordnance Survey maps and other evidence, suggest that it was built circa 1890.

{1} Single storey industrial building on corner of Crown Street and Regent Street - now in use by R Toward (Sports and Luggage Ltd). Film 10, photo 13. One of the buildings on Crown Street may be Humphrey and Barlow Boot and Shoe Manufactury.

{2} This single-storey factory building is on the south side of Regent Street with an extension along the east side of Crown Street. The Regent Street range, built by 1899, is of pier-and-panel construction in red brick with a blue brick plinth and sills. The original entrance is located in the canted bay on the corner of Crown Street and Regent Street; the others, including the large garage-type doors, are insertions. The eight-bay north front has a series of large windows. The roof has been re-laid with concrete tiles.
The Crown Street extension, first shown on the 1924 OS map, is a single-storey, garage-like building, the pier-and-panel west gable of which incorporates an oculus and two sets of garage-type doors. Comparison with the 1899 edition of the OS map shows that it was built on a vacant plot or yard. This yard reached from Crown Street may have provided the goods entrance for the Regent Street factory. The north doorway retains its original form, while the wider south doorway is a later insertion or enlargement, truncating one of the piers.
The original use of this complex is not clear, though the tall single storey suggests a use other than boot & shoe making. It could have been a small engineering works. A two-storey, three-bay building (now Lawford West Ltd, building supplies) immediately south of the Crown Street extension is also built on the original factory plot, and may have been associated with it, but by 1967 formed a separate occupancy (OS).

<1> Ballinger J., 1999, Northamptonshire Extensive Urban Survey: Industrial Period, (unchecked) (Digital archive). SNN4.

<2> ENGLISH HERITAGE, 2000, Northamptonshire Boot and Shoe Survey, Kettering site 14 (checked) (Catalogue). SNN105075.

<3> Historic England, Regent Street, Kettering, BF103552 (Archive). SNN115144.

Record last edited

Jun 1 2023 2:28PM