5, Broad Street

Number 5 Broad Street, Bromyard

A 17th-century shop with accommodation above, remodelled in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, with an early 20th-century shop front.

The building is constructed from an oak timber frame with plaster panels and plaster render to the ground floor of the frontage. The chimney stacks are built of stone with brick shafts, and the fenestration is timber. Internally, there is plaster decoration.

The building follows a cross-passage plan of three unequal bays, with an irregularly projecting rear range containing the stair. It rises to two storeys with an attic and cellars. There have been minor 20th-century alterations to the building's circulation.

The three-bay front has 18th-century plaster render to the ground floor. To the right is a projecting double shop front of early 20th-century date with stall risers. The left bay is recessed beneath an under-built jetty and contains a three-light window to the ground floor. The first floor has had its render removed to reveal the timber frame, including ovolo-moulded posts and girding beam with gouge-cut assembly marks. Three late 18th or early 19th-century sashes are set within earlier openings at this level. To the rear of the left bay is a three-light casement window with ovolo-moulded mullions. To the rear of the central and right bays is a later 17th-century single-bay two-storey range with a single-storey addition under a catslide roof. Three chimney stacks with brick shafts are set within the roofs.

Internally, the ground-floor rooms have visible timber framing, mainly comprising chamfered axial beams with cut stops. The left bay contains former jetty framing and an altered carved console. The central bay has a large fireplace with chamfered stone jambs, an oak lintel, and an apotropaic (witches') mark, along with a reset 17th-century door with 17th-century strap hinges. Parts of the right bay ceiling are decorated in plaster with a reeded moulding around the edges of the beams and raised motifs on the main ceiling panels: stylised fleur-de-lis, square blocks, and four-petal roses. The fireplace features a possible early 19th-century double shelf with consoles beneath a mantle shelf and a later cast-iron grate. The first floor also has exposed structure with assembly marks. The room in the left bay has a window with ovolo-moulded mullions and modern leaded lights. The attic is lit by modern dormer windows, though evidence of five former dormers remains in the front structure. The stair within the rear wing may be the remains of a primary staircase re-sited from the main range. A relocated carved console with an acanthus design is located on the first floor of the rear wing.

Bromyard is a small market town first recorded around 840. Number 5 Broad Street is situated on one of the principal thoroughfares, adjoining the market square. The street appears to have been fully built up by the early 17th century, although some plots have been redeveloped since. The building is of early to mid-17th-century date and appears to have functioned as a dwelling and shop from its inception, with the rear wing added slightly later. During the late 18th and early 19th centuries, the main range was remodelled, the jettied front was under-built, and it became known as the Red Lion public house. Ordnance Survey maps from 1887 show the building as a public house, which closed in 1938. A projecting shop front was added to the right bays around this period, though the precise timing is unclear from map evidence, and the ground floor was refitted as a shop in the mid to late 20th century. Some internal alterations occurred in the later 20th century, and the building continues to serve a dual residential and commercial use.