Scarbrough Hotel

The Scarbrough Hotel is a public house, largely dating to the late 18th century, with earlier remains and early 20th-century refronting. The building is constructed of brick with terracotta tile cladding, and likely has a slate roof. It is two storeys high with five first-floor windows. The facade features decorative details including attached Ionic columns, contrasting colours to the window surrounds, moulded swags, a dentilled cornice, and a parapet with the hotel and brewery name in raised lettering.

The interior is fitted with 20th-century public house fittings. Examination of the roof structure revealed extensive alterations across three main phases of construction. In the southwest corner, a horizontal beam set diagonally to the corner walls suggests a dragon beam in a former timber-framed building, with a mortise cut in its upper face. A rafter rising to the ridge may have been part of a hipped roof structure. Reused timber and brickwork visible under the eaves appear to be 18th century or earlier, handmade with irregular size.

A second phase of construction features two trusses with pairs of tall queen posts clasping a high collar, held together with pegged joints. Lath and plaster and whitewash on the timbers in the front half of the roof and at gable ends suggest the roof space was divided into rooms lit by gable windows. A spine wall was built forward of the ridge, with cross beams cut and sections lifted and incorporated into the rear wall. Ironwork was used in these alterations.

The building occupies the site of the medieval manor house of Leeds, which was a brick hall depicted on Cossin’s map of 1725 and substantially rebuilt by Richard Wilson between 1761 and 1765. By the early 19th century, the building had become a hotel established by Henry Scarborough, with alterations to the upper part of the house at that time, and was known as the former residence of the Wilson family. The surviving roof structure corresponds to these alterations, with the first phase representing remains of the manor house structure built by the Wilsons, the second showing the queen posts and wall lining attributed to Henry Scarborough, and the third being the early 20th-century refurbishment and refronting.