St Oswald'S Hospital (Almshouses And Chaplain'S House)

WORCESTER

SO8455NE THE TYTHING 620-1/8/649 (East side) 05/04/71 St Oswald's Hospital (Almshouses and Chaplain's House)

GV II

Almshouses. 1873 by Henry Rowe (City Architect). Red brick with stone dressings. Plain clay tile, 2-span roof with parapets to eaves and gables. Multi-shafted brick stacks with stone dressings and pots to main ridges. Stone bellcote to rear of gatehouse roof. PLAN: Double-depth ranges arranged along 3 sides (W, N and S) of a lawned courtyard, the Chapel of St Oswald's (qv) partially enclosing the east side. The courtyard is accessed via a central gatehouse in the west range with the Chaplain's house forming part of the range to the north. Victorian Gothic style with paired gables. West (entrance) elevation: 2-storeys, 16 first-floor windows. Stone detailing includes parapets, copings, window and door surrounds, moulded string courses and plinth, statue of St. Oswald. First-floor windows are mainly double and staggered-triple lancet style with fixed and side-hung 3-pane metal casements. Ground-floor has mainly 2 and 3-light square-head mullioned windows, metal frames to glazing. Some small single-light windows to both floors. Gatehouse entrance has pointed arch with pair of framed and lattice-braced planked doors with ornate wrought-iron strap-hinges. Above the entrance is an ornamented staggered-triple lancet window, each arch surmounted by a gable with pinnacles and decorated with crockets; the centre-light is blind and contains a statue of St. Oswald. Street elevation to south is similar but with more single-light windows. The extension of this wing to the east is c1990. The courtyard elevations correspond closely to those facing west but access to each dwelling is from the courtyard only via planked doors with Caernarvon arch style heads; 3-pane overlight with egmental-arched head. Clock under gabled hood-moulding in apex of gatehouse gable; bellcote with bell over. Chaplain's House is in matching style but taller and more ornate. Symmetrical composition. 3 first-floor windows of staggered triple lancet style with gables over. Central entrance; planked door as per other houses but with 1/1 sidelights. Entrance flanked by 4-light stone bays; Caernarvon-arch heads to each light. INTERIOR: not inspected. (Buildings of England: Pevsner N: Worcestershire: Harmondsworth: 1968-1985: 334).