29,30,31, CHURCH STREET

29, 30, and 31 Church Street are two town houses that have been converted into three shops with workrooms above. They likely date from the mid-18th century but have undergone significant alterations in the 19th and 20th centuries. The buildings are constructed of brick, with Nos. 30 and 31 featuring scored stucco above the ground floor and sandstone dressings, topped with a slate roof. They have a double-depth plan with long back extensions and stand three storeys tall, with a total of eight windows across the front.

No. 29 has been rebuilt, likely in the early 20th century, and includes a shop front at the ground floor and sash windows above. Nos. 30 and 31 also have shop fronts at the ground floor, while the first floor features sash windows without glazing bars but with exposed boxes, and fixed windows on the second floor. There are chimneys at the gable ends in front of the ridge.

The right-hand return wall, which faces Church Row, is built in English garden wall bond and has a blocked doorway with a wooden doorcase that includes fluted pilasters and a dentilled cornice. This wall also displays a large modern advertisement board at the first floor, various 19th-century sash windows (including a small square six-pane sash in the attic), and a two-window back extension that continues to the rear, featuring a doorway and similar windows, along with two ridge chimney stacks.

Inside, the principal features of interest are on the upper floors. No. 29 contains the top flights of a fine 18th-century open-well staircase, which has an open string, carved brackets, three turned balusters per tread, a ramped and moulded handrail, and a fielded panel dado. Nos. 30 and 31 have a former drawing room on the first floor with fielded panelling (though now partitioned), remnants of original staircases, and a pegged collar-truss roof. This building is one of only two examples of 18th-century domestic interiors known to survive in the town, the other being 11 Friargate, while 27 Church Street only retains the upper flights of a staircase, from which two out of every three balusters have been removed.