68 AND 70, WALMGATE

A house, now used as a shop and office, was likely constructed around 1700, though it may have earlier origins, and was altered around 1985. It is built of orange brick in a Flemish bond pattern, with a painted tile shopfront. The roof is covered in pantiles, with a brick coping and end stacks, one of which has been rebuilt. It has a five-window front, with a glazed shop door between plate glass windows. The first-floor windows are eight-pane sashes with painted stone sills and segmental arches. Raised brick bands are located below and above the first-floor windows, the band below interrupted by the shopfront. A dentil and modillion eaves cornice runs along the top, returning at the right end, with an inverted bell rainwater head dated 1783.

The interior entrance hall features a moulded and keyed round arch on pilasters, with fluting on one side and panelled reveals leading to the stairhall. A panelled staircase rises around an open well from the ground to the first floor, featuring an open string, panelled treadends, column-on-vase balusters, and a moulded handrail that ramps up to column newels. There is a blocked doorway in a bolection-moulded architrave at the foot of the stairs, and a renewed round-headed staircase window with radial glazing, flanked by fluted Corinthian pilasters. The first floor has a plaster ceiling over the staircase, decorated with a moulded, enriched cornice and a circular centre panel with foliate spandrels. A large front room is fitted with bolection-moulded panelling below a moulded cornice. This room contains a blocked fireplace and panelled overmantel flanked by Ionic pilasters, supporting an enriched moulded cornice. To the left is a round-arched, semicircular niche with shaped shelves on moulded brackets, while to the right is a door with eight raised and fielded panels leading to the earlier staircase, within a keyed round-arched architrave. A small front room is panelled with applied mouldings above a dado rail, and has a bold cornice with a guttae over a triglyph frieze. An eared fireplace is set within a moulded surround, rising to a cornice shelf, with a broken pedimented overmantel panel flanked by foliated volutes. The roof is ceiled above the collar, with three cranked principal rafter trusses visible.