Frank Hudson & Sons Furniture Factory
Location/Address
Hudson & Sons Furniture Factory
Rosebery Avenue
High Wycombe
Type
Description
One of the last remaining utilitarian chair factories. Built in 1920s in common Fleton bricks, then the cheapest brick available, under a slate roof. The roadway façade is the more prominent view of the building complex, with the old workshops behind. Internally the old pine trusses are still visible as is the boarded roof structure. This was one of the new wave of industrial buildings built on the outskirts of the town around which a small satellite community developed, with its school, church and corner shops. In this small enclave this is now the only remaining intact commercial furniture building. Its retention is important both historically and socially showing how this part of the town developed in the late Victorian/early C20th Industrial Expansion.
The building is typical of many of the buildings associated with the town’s furniture industry in that it was constructed using cheap materials and functional form with few architectural pretentions. The rear workshop is of traditional earlier form, and the boarded timber upper storey and trusses remain. It adjoins what would have been its large yard for the storage of timber. The three storey block is characterful and has large metal framed windows to optimise natural light. The central loading bay survives. While the original roof covering was slate, it has now been altered to profiled metal sheeting but the essential form and appearance of the building remains substantially intact.
Single storey section to side is later addition and excluded from listing
Statement of Significance
Asset type
BuildingAge
Built in phases from 1920sRarity
Increasingly rare surviving furniture factory
Date Listed
10 Jan 2023
Find Out More
Find out more about this Asset in Buckinghamshire's Local Heritage List:
https://local-heritage-list.org.uk/buckinghamshire/asset/8518
https://local-heritage-list.org.uk/buckinghamshire/asset/8518