Rootes Car Showroom, Maidstone
An externally well preserved example of a major motor showroom of the 1930s, listed Grade II.
In 2020 planning and listed building consent was granted to convert into 80 apartments with retail units on the ground floor.
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Address:
Len House,
Mill Street,
Maidstone, ME15 6YD
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Visitor Centre:
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During the 1920s a number of large and impressive showrooms were built to display motor cars. They often occupied prestigious locations near town centres, and many are redolent of the architectural style of the time. Most have now found other uses. Fine surviving examples may be found as far apart as Llandrindod Wells, Glasgow, and Eastbourne.
Built in 1938 for the Rootes Group by Howard & Souster, the plan is an irregular L-shape. It is built on two storeys with a triangular tower. It is a steel framed re-inforced concrete structure faced with stone blocks, now painted white and has a flat roof.
The double height showroom frontage has a polished black stall-riser and an integral facia board. It is a particularly well preserved example of the modernist style embraced by the motor trade in the 1930s.
With a large showroom floor uninterrupted by columns and with an elegant streamlined exterior glowing with neon light, it was with some justification referred to as a palace of modern motoring.
For many years it was a Peugeot Dealership but then empty for some time.
Plans have been approved for conversion of the Grade II listed building into appartments and retail units.
Images: David Anstiss and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence
Danny P Robinson (cc-by-sa/2.0)
In 2020 planning and listed building consent was granted for a mixed-use scheme seeing the building converted into 80 apartments with retail units on the ground floor.
See:
By Road: On the east side of Mill Street, north of Palace Avenue.
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Demaus, A. B., Motoring in the 20s and 30s. Batsford, ISBN 0 7134 1538 X(1979)
Flower, Michael & Wynn Jones, Raymond, One Hundred Years of Motoring, RAC, ASIN B00159N2JQ (1981)
Harmsworth, Sir Alfred, Motors and Motor Driving, Longmans, The Badminton Library, (1904)
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