New Continental Hotel, Plymouth

Grade-II listed 01/05/75, exterior listed, interior may be of interest. List Entry No 138 6246, Legacy System No 473630. PLYMOUTH

SX4754 MILLBAY ROAD, Hoe 740-1/57/293 (North side) 01/05/75 New Continental Hotel and attached forecourt walls and railings (Formerly Listed as: MILLBAY ROAD, Plymouth Continental Hotel)

GV II

Large hotel. c1870s, built to cater for the GWR passengers to Millbay. Stucco with stucco detail. Dry slate mansard roofs behind balustraded parapets; attic windows; stuccoed end and axial stacks; steep octagonal roof to corner cupola with round-arched arcade, ogee dome and ball finial. PLAN: large plan with cranked elevations flanking splayed corner, the taller corner block slightly later. EXTERIOR: 3 storeys and 5-storey corner block, all plus attic over basement; 10:3-bay front to Millbay Road; symmetrical 3-bay front to left-hand return, plus C20 extension on the left, 3-bay corner with splayed centre bay to right-hand corner and 2:4:2-bay right-hand return with right-hand bays broken forward. Many original hornless sashes with vertical glazing bars to original part and many original horned sashes to later part. Stucco detail includes: channelled rustication to ground floor; rusticated quoins flanking canted bay windows of left and right bays of left-hand return; quoin strips flanking 3 corner bays. Original part also has moulded cornice above ground floor, segmental pediments on consoles to pilastered 1st-floor openings; 2nd-floor sill string on brackets, moulded eared architraves, and modillion cornice to parapet. Later part has mid-floor entablature with moulded cornices, moulded architraves, and segmental pediments to 1st floor. Millbay Road front has original pilastered and segmental-arched doorway to 5th bay from left. Corner has tripartite entrance with keyed round-arched moulded doorheads as short barrel vaults on moulded cornices; spoked fanlights and glazed doors. INTERIOR: not inspected but likely to reflect the high quality of the exterior. SUBSIDIARY FEATURES: forecourt walls to left-hand return and right-hand return, those to right-hand return with square piers with moulded caps and linking wrought-iron railings, the other return with a rock-faced plinth and wrought-iron railings with arrow-head finials.

A complete stuccoed design in the Italianate style, contrasting with the Duke of Cornwall Hotel opposite.