Chester Visitor Centre

Chester Visitor Centre, originally St John's School, was founded in 1810 by Robert Earl Grosvenor and rebuilt between 1882 and 1883 by his grandson E.R. Robson for the first Duke of Westminster. The building features stone-dressed hard red brick with hipped red-brown tile roofs.

The front of the building is three storeys plus an attic, facing St John's Church, which reduces its apparent scale, while the sides and rear are two storeys plus an attic. The front has unpierced end bays, each with a round-arched recessed panel displaying the armorial device of stone, the Grosvenor Arms, and a "W" to the left, with three mitres and the date 1883 to the right. The ground floor includes four round-arched openings that hold two stone cross-windows between two pairs of boarded double doors, each with dual overlights. A stone stringcourse runs beneath four pairs of six-pane casements that alternate with recessed stone panels, with a stone apron below each end panel supporting a square four-pane light. The second floor features a similar stone window-band with a slightly varied rhythm of casements and panels.

At the top, there are two stone-dressed shaped attic gables, each with two six-pane casements. A timber hexagonal belfry sits on the ridge, topped with a cupola roof, a louvre band, a lead finial, and a weather vane. The sides and back of the building are similarly designed but feature simpler brick openings for tall classroom windows, with dormer gables that match those at the front.

Inside, the structure remains largely unaltered, although almost all surfaces are covered in mock timber framing.