GILLINGHAM TQ7669NE CENTRAL AVENUE, Pembroke 686-1/2/89 (South side) 28/09/90 Former Blake Barrack (Formerly Listed as: CHATHAM CENTRAL AVENUE, Chatham Maritime (South side) 4 Barrack blocks, Grenville, Anson, Nelson and Blake) GV II Barracks, now offices and laboratories. c1902 by Sir Henry Pilkington. Red brick with Portland stone dressings, brick gable and ridge and lateral stacks and slate cross-gabled roof. STYLE: Free Edwardian Baroque. PLAN: single-depth axial. EXTERIOR: 3 storeys with attics to end cross ranges; 25-bay range. Long symmetrical ranges have a plinth, banded rustication to a ground-floor plat band, second-floor impost band becoming corniced frieze on end gables, and a modillion eaves cornice, the 8-bay intermediate ranges divided by shallow paired lateral stacks to the first- and second-floor with a central downpipe. 3-bay end gables have clasping pilaster strips, with scrolled ends to raking coping, and thin lateral stacks flanking central windows to a tall gable stack with a central rib; deep, full-height central canted bay. Segmental-arched 6/6-pane sashes have large split keystones to ground and first floors, brick and stone voussoirs to the second; ground-floor windows to the intermediate sections wider with side lights. Return gables have an outer blind bay, with a central porch with blocked Tuscan columns to an entablature with BLAKE in raised letters and a segmental pediment and a half-glazed double door, and a bay above with entablature and parapet, paired 4/4-pane sashes in a keyed architrave and 4/4-pane sashes to the sides; above is a round-arched 8/8-pane sash with architrave and brackets to a round-arched pediment set forward from the cornice over a cartouche with flanking fish. Rear elevations plainer, with square latrine towers at each end with pyramidal roofs connected to the barrack by a ground-floor arch and 1-light range above. Good cast-iron dated hoppers and square downpipes. Roofs have banded ridge and lateral stacks, some truncated, with late C20 dormer louvres and air conditioning units. INTERIOR: plain with axial corridors and stairs in ends and central projecting sections. HISTORY: one of 4 matching barracks at the former HMS Pembroke, and part of a carefully planned group with the Officer's Mess, Captain's House, Motor Dept (qqv), and other ancillary buildings. Listing NGR: TQ7665169537