Micklegate House And Attached Railings And Lamp Brackets

Micklegate House and Attached Railings and Lamp Brackets, York

This is a Grade I listed town house with attached railings and lamp brackets, comprising numbers 88 and 90 Micklegate. The house was built in 1752 for Sir John Bourchier of Beningbrough, probably designed by the architect John Carr. It underwent alterations and extensions during the 19th and 20th centuries.

The front elevation is constructed of orange-red brick laid in Flemish bond, set on a stone-faced basement with rusticated quoins. The rear is built of buff-pink brick with orange-red brick dressings. A dentil eaves band runs beneath a projecting modillion cornice of timber, and the roof is slate with brick chimney stacks.

The front is seven bays wide across three storeys above the basement. The three centre bays are pedimented and break forward. The centrepiece is a pedimented doorcase of detached Corinthian columns, containing a door of six raised and fielded panels with a radial overlight in a rusticated round-arched surround with moulded imposts. At the right end is a panelled service door with divided overlight. Both doors are approached by steps; those to the front door are shaped with anthemion pattern bootscrapers. Windows throughout are sashes: twelve-paned on the ground and first floors, six-paned on the second floor, all beneath gauged brick arches with stone fasciated keyblocks. Ground and first floor windows have sill bands; first and second floor windows have raised bands of painted stone.

The rear elevation has a basement and three storeys. A central round-arched radial-glazed staircase window sits between the ground and first floors. Other windows are twelve- or six-paned sashes with brick arches and stone sills. Raised brick bands mark the first and second floors. Moulded rainwater goods, stamped with the initials JMB and the Bourchier crest, are original to the building.

The interior contains notable features throughout. The cellars are brick-vaulted; one room retains a second kitchen fireplace and bread oven. The ground floor entrance hall has a stone-flagged floor, moulded dado rail, and carved marble fireplace with a plaster panelled ceiling featuring an enriched modillion cornice. A panelled round arch with moulded imposts leads to the stairhall at the rear. The left front room has a dado rail, panelled walls, enriched cornice, and marble fireplace with fluted frieze and cornice shelf beneath a bolection-moulded overmantel. Eared doorcases have pulvinated friezes and dentilled cornices. The right front room contains fitted cupboards and drawers. The staircase hall has a stone-flagged floor. The main staircase features cantilevered stairs with three balusters—alternately turned, fluted and twisted—to each tread, and a moulded serpentine handrail wreathed at the foot around a turned newel. Matching ramped-up dado panelling accompanies the staircase. The staircase window is a round-headed radial-glazed sash in an Ionic arch on fluted pilasters. A secondary staircase to the second floor has turned balusters and a ramped-up moulded handrail. The left rear room has a moulded marble fireplace and firegrate with pulvinated frieze beneath a bolection-moulded overmantel, and an alcove cupboard with 19th-century glazed doors. The right rear room contains a segment-arched kitchen fireplace. Windows in the left rear room have painted glass inserts by William Peckett.

The first floor stairwell has an enriched modillion cornice. The ceiling features plaster panels enriched with arabesques of leaves and tendrils, and medallions containing busts in relief. The pedimented doorcases on the landing are later replacements. The left front room has a moulded plaster ceiling, cut by an inserted partition wall, with a central panel depicting a dog and crane in relief framed in asymmetrical scrolls and foliage, and four corner panels each enclosing a relief-moulded head. The left rear room retains panelling and fitted drawers.

The roof contains four numbered principal rafter trusses with notched and pegged joints. The cross-gabled roof at the rear has been renewed.

The wrought-iron railings and lamp brackets are mounted on a low plinth of moulded stone. The railings sweep up the front steps to the doorcase, with palmette bootscrapers at each side. They are of square section with barbed spear tips and incorporate scrollwork panels with twisted finials. The doorcase is flanked by elaborate scrolled lamp brackets with rinceaux ornament.