Cumberland House

Cumberland House is a Grade I listed town house in York, now in office use. Built around 1710 for William Cornwall, who was Sheriff in 1700 and Lord Mayor in 1712 and 1725, it was remodelled in later periods, extended in the 19th century, and underwent restoration around 1950.

The building's basement is constructed of magnesian limestone, with upper floors of orange-red brick laid in Flemish bond. The ground floor frontage on Cumberland Street is stuccoed and lined to resemble ashlar. Raised and chamfered quoins and dressings are of ashlar stone. The building features a timber eaves cornice and a hipped tile roof with segment-gabled dormers and brick chimney stacks.

The Cumberland Street frontage presents two storeys above a moulded basement plinth, with four windows. A basement opening with a shouldered head and keyed tripartite lintel breaks the plinth at the left end. To its right is a shuttered opening in a plain surround with a flat lintel. The principal doorcase, positioned towards the right of centre, has sunk panel pilasters beneath an open segmental pediment on enriched bulbous consoles. The panelled double doors feature a tall overlight in an eared bolection-moulded architrave. Ground and first floor windows are 18-pane sashes with moulded stone sills; those on the ground floor have incised wedge lintels, whilst those on the first floor have flat arches of gauged brick. A raised first floor band with lower arris chamfered and a plain eaves frieze complete this elevation.

The King's Staith frontage is more substantial, displaying three storeys—basement, two main floors, and attic—arranged in five bays. The basement contains a wide doorway with a shouldered lintel, flanked by iron-grilled openings set in raised round-arched surrounds with keyblocks and imposts. All upper floor windows are 18-pane sashes with moulded stone sills, some renewed. All windows except those at the centre have flat arches of gauged brick; the centre windows feature prominent architraves, with the first floor example positioned above an apron. A moulded first floor cornice is complemented by an oversailing eaves cornice on bold modillions over a moulded frieze, both returned at the right end. The attic windows are three-light Yorkshire sashes set in altered elliptical arched openings. The gabled eaves display three-course brick bands. The rear elevation is largely obscured by adjacent buildings, though first floor windows to the rear of the right wing are 18-pane sashes.

Internally, the ground floor features stone stairs rising from the front door beneath a partitioned ceiling with moulded cornices. At the stair head, two keyed round arches rest on sunk panel pilasters with moulded imposts, panelled soffits and spandrels; the right arch is blocked by a window, the left closed by a glazed door. The entrance hall contains a bolection-moulded fireplace with a duck-nest grate and a chimneybreast cupboard with a three-panel door on H-hinges. A four-panel door in a hollow-moulded architrave leads to a small front room, while a keyed round arch on fluted Doric pilasters with panelled soffit and spandrels leads to the stairhall. The small front room is lined with bolection-moulded panelling between panelled pilasters carrying a moulded cornice, with a similarly moulded fireplace featuring a hob grate and panelled overmantel between four-panel doors. The large front room is fitted with bolection-moulded panelling and a moulded cornice; its fireplace displays a cornice shelf between foliate volutes and a round-headed overmantel panel, with semi-domed alcoves framed in keyed round arches on sunk panel pilasters flanking it. Stairhall doorcases are round-arched with round-headed twelve-panel doors. The cantilevered staircase has panelled treads with three balusters per tread, alternately fluted, twisted and turned, and a moulded handrail ramped up to fluted column newels, swept at the foot on a moulded curtail step. Matching dado panelling lines the stair well. The staircase window is radial-glazed with small pane sashes framed in a round arch on corbelled fluted pilasters.

On the first floor, landing doorcases are keyed round arches on sunk panel pilasters. The ceiling, above a coved acanthus leaf cornice, is panelled in plaster. The main rooms have moulded cornices, with two retaining bolection-moulded fireplaces; a third fireplace survives in the right end room on the Cumberland Street side. A room at the rear of the right wing has a plain fireplace with a later basket grate in a heavily moulded surround, a panelled window recess with seat, and a moulded cornice.

The attic level retains some simple fireplaces.