16 New Street

16 New Street is a three-storey town house dating to the 18th century, built of red brick laid in Flemish bond with brick dressings and a Swithland slate roof.

The house has an approximately square plan and faces east onto New Street. It features a shallow hipped roof with three tall, wide chimney stacks. Brick string courses mark the first and second floor levels.

The main façade has an entrance on the right-hand side with an early 19th-century doorcase featuring a deep cornice hood supported by shaped brackets above square corner blocks. The four-panel front door and jambs date to the 1930s and have central circular panels. The overlight is also from the 1930s, with metal glazing bars in a diamond pattern. The ground floor is otherwise blind. The first floor is lit by a large round-arch six-over-six pane sash window with radial glazing bars serving the staircase, flanked by six-over-six pane sashes under segmental brick arches of headers. The second floor has four three-over-six pane sashes. Windows are set flush in the wall and have mostly been reconditioned during recent conversion. The left side of the elevation continues southwards as a short section of wall at ground-floor height with tiled coping.

On the south elevation, the ground and first floors feature a segmental bow on the right. Each floor has three tall six-over-six pane sashes under gauged brick arches, probably of early 19th-century date, except the central ground-floor aperture which contains a modern French door. Another French door lies to the left, with a first-floor sash directly above. To the left of the bay is a six-over-six pane sash on each of the ground and first floors. The second floor is lit by four widely-spaced three-over-six pane sashes, also under gauged brick arches.

The interior retains its original four-room configuration on each floor. High-quality decorative features survive, including many fireplaces and joinery, though some doors were replaced during recent conversion. The entrance hall is dominated by an impressive open-well stair with two quarter turns, a cut string with raised ornamental tread ends, and a flat-section steel balustrade supporting a moulded handrail that is sharply ramped up to the newel posts. Some newel posts are fluted with square blocks and flat square caps. Corner posts on the moulded dado are also fluted.

Principal ground and first-floor rooms on the south side overlook the garden and retain moulded skirting boards, decorative cornices, and some six-panel doors in moulded doorcases. Rooms with the segmental bay have panelled shutters and handsome marble fireplaces with corner roundels. The ground-floor fireplace is of yellow marble with a segmental arch cast iron insert and basket, while the first-floor fireplace is of grey marble with an ornamental basket grate and fireback embellished with an acanthus leaf design. Second-floor rooms, probably partly for servants, are generally plainer but retain attractive fireplaces with timber surrounds, some with corner roundels, and decorative cast iron hobgrates or baskets.