Numbers 90-98 Street

Numbers 90-98 Northgate Street, Chester

A row of five properties on the east side of Northgate Street, comprising what were probably originally two mid-18th-century town houses with shops, now converted to three shops and offices. The frontage is arranged as two distinct compositions: Nos 90 and 92 expressed as one town house, and Nos 94 and 96 as another, though their interiors overlap. No. 98 forms a third element of the group.

Exterior

Nos 90 and 92 are constructed of brown brick, laid in Flemish bond to the front and south elevation and English garden wall bond to the rear. A sandstone wing wall adjoining Little Abbey Gateway forms the lower part of the rear wall of No. 90 and probably the plinth at its south end. The roofs are of grey slate with main ridges parallel to the street. The buildings are three storeys high.

The shopfront to No. 90 is probably inter-war, featuring a recessed quadrant pane at the south-west corner, a central recessed doorway and a pattern of panels above the shop windows with panelled end-pilasters. The door to No. 92 has six fielded panels with an overlight containing a central circle and saltire bars, and a boarded fascia. The south-west corner of the upper storeys displays painted stone quoins with the stretcher side flush and the header face projecting. Each upper storey has two flush 12-pane sash windows with painted stone sills and gauged brick heads with keystones. The south end has a similar window to the second storey and a blocked opening in brick to the third storey. A decorative brick band consisting of one projecting course, one recessed course and two successively projecting courses lies beneath a 12-course parapet with a moulded stone cornice and stone quoins to the north end.

Nos 94 and 96, slightly lower than Nos 90 and 92, are expressed as a single wide-fronted three-storey town house with two later shopfronts. The early 20th-century shopfront to No. 94 has a stone plinth, a recessed door with a large glass panel above two shaped panels, pilasters and a blind-box. The shopfront to No. 96 is of no particular interest. Brick end pilasters rise to the upper storeys. The second storey has three flush 12-pane sashes with painted stone sills and keys to gauged brick heads, the central one smaller and set at a higher level. The third storey has four 12-pane sashes similar to those on the second storey. A band of two separated brick courses with a flashed oversailing course sits at the base of a 10-course parapet with plain stone coping. The north gable is coped with a ridge chimney.

The rear elevation of No. 90 is blank. No. 92 has a two-and-a-half-storey canted rear bay with a former basement doorway now converted to a 2-pane window with a rendered apron. Tripartite sashes of 4, 12 and 4 panes light the first and second storeys beneath a lean-to roof, with a similar arrangement in the gable of the third storey. No. 94, situated in the recess between the canted bay of No. 92 and the rear wing of No. 96, has a four-fielded-panel door above two flush panels, a flush 12-pane sash to the second storey and a 9-pane sash to the third storey. The gabled rear wing of No. 96 has a 16-pane recessed sash to the first and second storeys and a 9-pane sash to the third storey, all with stone sills and segmental brick heads. The south side of this wing contains a 3-pane basement window, a bricked-up opening to the first storey and a recessed 9-pane sash to the third storey; two small inserted windows appear in the north side. Only the third storey is visible north of the rear wing, which has a flush 12-pane sash.

Interior

The basement is largely 18th-century in character. The entrance hall contains three stone steps. The room behind the entrance has three moulded plaster-faced beams and a cornice, with a 6-fielded-panel door to the rear north room and a plain 6-panel door. A stair in closed well leads to the second storey. The second storey front south room features an altered door in a case with heavy architrave, part of a moulded cornice, a stone fireplace and a probably late 19th-century cast-iron safe. A panelled case surrounds the 6-panel door to the rear room.

A rear room contains a 6-panel door, cornice and a marble fireplace with a mantel supported on slender Roman Doric pillars. A cupboard with an architrave to a 6-fielded-panel door is present, and the landing rail has turned newels and column-on-vase balusters. The stair to the third storey has a closed string, a newel with turned central portion and two turned balusters with square plinths and caps. Doors to third-storey rooms, which could not be inspected as they were unoccupied, have four fielded panels. The attic stair is similar to that leading to the third storey but with square newels. Parts of the interior could not be inspected.