36 And 38, High Street

SJ 5441 8/99 1.5.51

WHITCHURCH URBAN C.P. HIGH STREET (south-west side) Nos. 36 and 38 (formerly listed as Express Cafe)

GV II

House, latterly cafe, now shop. Dated 1677 at rear, remodelled in the late C18. Rendered, probably over brick, with brick addition to rear. Probably incorporating timber framing. Plain tile roof, hipped to right. 3 storeys over basement. Moulded stone string course between first and second floors, moulded cornice, and parapet with moulded coping. Integral brick end stack to left (top rebuilt c.1900) on dressed grey sandstone base. 2 bays; tripartite glazing bar sashes with stone cills and slightly- segmental heads. Shop-front of c.1900 with pair of plate-glass windows, central recessed pair of half-glazed doors with engraved glass, flanking panelled pilasters, and deep fascia. Wrought-iron sign bracket between second-floor windows. C18 three-storey addition at rear with plat band. Interior: ground-floor remodelled c.1900 with Fulgoni's Cafe on ground floor and first floor to front. Ovolo-moulded beams with ogee stops to first- and second-floor rooms. Elaborate oak L-plan staircase of c.1677 with half landings, angled balustrades to full landings, pulvinated closed string, rectangular-section balusters, grip handrail, and square newel posts with bulbous finials and pendants. Flight from ground floor removed during c.1900 remodelling and attic flight altered at some time to turn 90° in opposite direction. First-floor front room: fireplace of c.1690-1700 to right with bolection-moulded architrave, pulvinated frieze and moulded cornice. Probably c.1900 Seventeenth-Century style carved wooden fireplace to left with figures, pilasters, frieze with guilloche ornament, and carved cornice. Room formerly 2 but now divided by folding screen of c.1900. Dado rail. Half-glazed café door of c.1900. C19 cast-iron grate to first floor. Ground-floor top-lit rear room of c.1900 with husk swags in frieze. Basement with pair of C17 ovolo-moulded beams. Although the facade of the range has been altered, probably in the late C18 (windows etc.), the heavy moulded string course and cornice probably date from the C17, suggesting that the building has always been of brick construction, perhaps with timber-framed internal walls only. The datestone, recorded elsewhere (Town Trail etc.), was not noted at time of survey (November 1986).B.O.E., p. 314; Whitchurch Area Archaeological group, Whitchurch Rembered, ill. 21; Whitchurch Town Trail.

Listing NGR: SJ5413441581