The Kings Cantonese Restaurant And Attached Stable Block To Rear

House, now restaurant with former stable block attached to rear range. Probably mid-18th century with early 19th century addition. Dressed sandstone with ashlar dressings and quoins, stone slate roofs. 2 storeys with attic. 2-cell direct-entry plan, double depth, L-shaped with wing attached to rear of first cell.

The main house has a 3-bay symmetrical facade. The central doorway has composite jambs and ashlar lintel with segmental arch and dropped keystone, with a much-weathered moulded surround. Above the door is an enriched carved panel with two split balusters set either side of a raised circle which bears marks of the gnomon of a former sundial. Above this is a blind bullseye window with an oval recessed surround having a ball in relief. To either side on both floors are windows with plain-stone surrounds and overlapping sills and lintels, possibly originally tripartite sashed windows reduced in width, now with modern timber glazing of tripartite form with applied diamond leading. The building has curved gutter brackets, coped gables with kneelers and ashlar stacks.

The left-hand return, which fronts King Street, is set in the house gable and has two windows to the ground floor with plain stone surrounds and projecting sills, and a smaller one above with a blocked window to the attic.

Attached to the rear of the house is a 2-storey long range at right angles, comprising two builds as indicated by quoins separating the two cells. The first cell has 2-light windows to each floor. The second cell has a doorway with monolithic jambs to the left of a 19th century single-light sash, with an 18th century 2-light window above. It has square gutter brackets. A single-storey link connects to the left-hand corner block, originally the stables and a separate structure, which projects forward and terminates at the road junction.

The former stable building has regularly coursed stonework with a hipped stone-slate roof. The elevation to King Street is obscured by hoarding, but interior evidence shows six tall arch-headed windows (now blocked). The rear elevation, facing Whitehall Road, has a former taking-in door to the first floor reduced to a window. Attached to the left and integral with this building is a single-storey range with corrugated iron roof, possibly originally a cart shed. The right-hand return of the house and attached buildings is partly rendered.

Interior: The ground floor of the house is largely featureless apart from a dog-leg stair, open-strung with decorative stringing, modern stick balusters and handrail, and panelled understair with raised-and-fielded panels. The first floor has oak beamed ceilings with stop-chamfered spine beams and slender wavy floor-joists which support the attic floor. The front windows have panelled surrounds with raised-and-fielded panels and under panels.

The long range has a roof with a single oak king-post truss with heavily cambered tie-beam and long braces to a square-set ridge. Low angled principal rafters carry single continuously scarfed purlins. Above the west 2-light window is a deep oak lintel.

In the stable, the west wall has six tall recessed blank arches with semicircular-arched heads with brick soldiers. A continuous timber sill has a metal-railed hay-rack with substantial bars surviving to four of the recesses. The east wall has two doorways (one blocked) and a window with the tie-stone jamb of the door forming the window sill. Between the doors is a large timber rack with long wooden pegs for hanging harness. The hayloft floor is carried by three oak spine beams with run-out stops. A brick division wall to the north end formerly supported the hay-loft floor (most joists gone), with a taking-in door in the north gable, under which was a tack-room.

The stable roof comprises four bays with soft-wood fish-bone king-post trusses with the tie-beam bolted through to the king post. Two pairs of oak tusked-purlins chamfered with run-out stops, the through tenons pegged, support original oak rafters. The hipped ends have ties at right angles.

The building is in a prominent position at the junction of two main roads. The house is built alongside the Bradford and Wakefield Turnpike Road of 1752–3, which may well be the date of the construction of the house. The stable and cart shed or coach house follows the alignment of the Leeds and Whitehall Turnpike Road of 1825–6, the probable date of the stable addition.