Bushwackers

Bushwackers, Worcester

This house, originally known as The Old Trinity House and later the Worcester Diocesan Church House, stands on The Avenue in Worcester. Dating from around 1750, it has undergone significant alterations including rebuilding of the west facade and additions probably dating to 1907, and a conversion to restaurant use with restorations around 1994.

The building is a 2-storey structure with attics. The west facade is rendered in red brick in Flemish bond with ashlar pilasters, a porch, keystones and finials. The east facade is of pinkish-red brick in Flemish bond with ashlar quoins and architraves, with a rendered basement. The roof is a plain tile hipped design with tall clusters of pinkish-red brick stacks on the north ridge and south end, featuring oversailing courses and pots.

The plan comprises a central stairhall with single-depth arrangement. The ground floor has been altered but the south room remains intact. A corridor at the north west provided access to a wing and service stair, probably added around 1907, though it may be original. The north room has been opened up. The rear east facade is executed in Gothick style.

The west facade displays 2 storeys with attics across 3 bays in proportions 1:5:1 for the first-floor windows. Two giant part-fluted pilasters frame the central three windows, surmounted by a crowning frieze and broken pediment with a central obelisk, with further obelisks over columns. The centre has 1/1 horned sashes and the outer bays have 6/2 sashes, all with flat arches of gauged brick. The rusticated central porch features a scrolled swan-neck pediment with a re-used finial and two outer finials, double panelled doors, and a cambered fanlight with radial glazing bars and fluted keystone. A worn plaque above the door reads: 'The Old Trinity House / ... the ... re-constructed / .... foundations; / .... 1907 adapted as the ... Worcester Diocesan Church House.' Two attic roof dormers with pedimented gables contain 6/1 sashes. The projecting wings on either side have full-height 5-sided bays with 6/6, 6/1 and 1/1 sashes.

The east facade comprises 2 storeys with attics and basement across 3 bays, the centre bay projecting. Quoins mark the angles, with those to the centre alternating brick and stone. The outer bays and returns to the centre have a 3-course band. Windows to ground and first floors employ Venetian forms, with ogeed arches to the centre and round arches to the outer windows. The central window has a 6/6 sash with ogeed glazing bars to the head, flanked by 4/4 sashes with Y-glazing to the heads, all with shaped architraves, finials to the apex of the ogee, imposts and sills. A similar surround frames the central entrance, with steps leading to a part-glazed renewed door with an ogeed overlight containing Gothick glazing bars, flanked by round-arched windows with 4-pane lights and Y-tracery to the heads. The shaped architrave features imposts. Above the entrance sits a shaped plaque. A crowning moulded cornice caps the facade. Three roof dormers have 6/2 sashes and ogeed gables with Gothick glazing bars. To the basement, the left side has three pointed-arched recesses with gabled buttresses between them, while the right side has a single arched opening with Gothick glazing bars to the blind head.

The interior retains much original plasterwork and joinery. A cantilevered staircase with shaped tread ends features an elaborate wrought-iron balustrade and ramped handrail with a large wreath, and a panelled dado with fluted pilasters. Embellished architraves frame Venetian windows with column clusters between the sashes throughout, finished with ogees surmounted by urns.

The plasterwork displays considerable richness. The hall ceiling includes an embellished frieze and cornice with quatrefoils to the ground floor and fleurons to the first floor. The ground floor ceiling retains a delicate plaster rose, while the upper floor features an oval with swags and scrolling grape motif within, and scrolled embellishments to the angles. The ground floor room to the south displays a central ceiling motif featuring musical instruments and doves, with an egg and dart cornice. The north room has a central embellished oval with foliate motifs to the angles. Some windows to the west facade retain 18th-century joinery including panelled shutters, now painted in. The basement features twist-stem columns around the walls with ribs to a barrel-vaulted ceiling.

Pevsner observed that underlying some of the evidently Victorian work on the front is an early 18th-century house with giant fluted pilasters and fluted keystones. The building served as the Worcester Diocesan Church House from 1907, then as the City Department of Health from around 1968 to 1985, before conversion to a restaurant circa 1994. It forms part of an excellent group of 18th-century buildings in The Cross, from which The Avenue leads as a short driveway. It is grouped with the Former Church of St Nicholas and other significant listed properties including those occupied by Bradford and Bingley Building Society, Halifax Building Society, Lloyds Bank, and Nos 20, 21, 28 and 31. Pevsner calls this 'Worcester's premier Gothic Revival House'.