73 West Parade

Location

The terrace faces the sea and runs between River Street and Butterton Road.

History

Built in stages to form a terrace of purpose-designed boarding houses, and dated 1889.

Exterior

Yellow brick with red brick and stone dressings, and Welsh slate roofs (replaced with concrete tiles to No 75). End wall stacks with red brick bands, lost or reduced in height in Nos 71 and 75. Comprises a terrace of 5 double-fronted villas, 3 storeyed with basement and attics, and 3-storeyed wings to rear. Each has central entrance with steep gables to either side. Entrances in ornate timber gabled porches, with some original doors surviving - in No 73, the 4-panelled door has shouldered glazed upper panels, and in No 74, deep moulding to 8 panels, the upper pair glazed. 3-storeyed canted bay windows to either side of entrances also run through basement storey and are ornamented with raised terracotta panels. These are a characteristic feature of seaside boarding houses and served the principal drawing rooms on each floor, typically located at the front of the house to command the sea view. Paired windows in attic storey beneath the gables. 2-pane sash windows throughout, linked across the whole terrace by continuous sill bands and stone cornice bands. Paired gables have pronounced bargeboards, originally with free-standing collar and king-post trusses, and finials. The finials largely survive, but the trusses are lost in all but No 74. Deep terracotta, tile and brick eaves bands. Basement areas originally had decorative cast-iron railings between squat chamfered stone gate posts; the railings surveive at No 74.

Reason for designation

The terrace is of exceptional interest as a purpose-built boarding house development which retains almost all its original detail. The best example of its type in Rhyl, it shows the characteristic multi-storeyed form with prominent bay windows, which served as a model for the sea-side boarding house in the later C19.