67 and 69 Westgate (formerly Bank House)

This is a large townhouse built around 1790 in Wakefield. It was originally constructed for Captain Francis Ingram, a founding partner of Wakefield’s first purpose-built bank, Ingram and Kennet.

The building is constructed of red brick in a Flemish bond pattern, with stone dressings to the front elevation and simpler red brickwork to the sides and rear. The roof is covered in Welsh slate.

The ground floor has been significantly altered; the current main entrance is the original carriage entrance leading to Rishworth’s Yard, as illustrated in 1823. The central main staircase, rising around a square open well, and the central service staircase (on the Bank Street elevation) remain, although they have been altered. Some rooms on the first floor have also been combined.

The north-facing Westgate elevation is five bays wide and three storeys high, with a basement. It features a stone basement, sill bands at ground and first floor levels, and a moulded modillion cornice with a blocking course concealing the low-pitched hipped roof. The ground floor has a prominent arcade of round arches constructed from rusticated stonework, with the easternmost arch originally serving as a carriage entrance and now the main entrance. All arches are now infilled with lighter-coloured Flemish-bonded brickwork, recessed within the arches and containing rubbed brick flat arches. The entrance door is a six-panel design with an overlight, while the other arches contain large, six-over-six pane hornless sash windows. Similar sash windows are present on the first and second floors, the upper windows one pane shorter. The central first-floor window has an apron with urn-shaped balusters, a moulded architrave, and a console bracketed pediment. The window above has a simpler architrave.

The west-facing Bank Street elevation is also five bays wide, with flanking blind bays and four-flued chimney stacks rising from the eaves. Windows have segmentally arched brick lintels and stone sills. The central bay has two tall stair windows; the upper one is round arched, and the lower one has been enlarged to form a doorway with a tall overlight. A former doorway has been reduced to a window on the left (north) side, with evidence of a blocked doorway in the northernmost bay.

The roof is not visible from ground level but includes further chimney stacks and a large glazed lantern that illuminates the central main staircase within the building.