Clock House And Clock Tower

The Clock House and Clock Tower date to the 14th century, with significant alterations around 1600, the 17th and 19th centuries. The building is now a shop, bakery, and flat, with a clock tower. It is timber framed, with plaster and weatherboard cladding, and a roof of handmade red plain tiles.

The house consists of a two-bay range facing northeast, and a wider parallel range to the rear. A hexagonal clock tower is built into the front left corner of the front range. A section of the original 14th century structure remains as a one-bay wing to the rear of the left bay, with a late 16th century axial stack at the front. A 17th century two-bay extension extends beyond this, with another axial stack in the rear bay. A 19th century extension of red brick in Flemish bond is added further beyond, with the rear gable end weatherboarded. The house is two storeys high, while the clock tower rises over four stages.

The ground floor has a 20th-century bow shop window. The first floor features two 20th-century metal casement windows with diamond leading. There is an open foot passage on the right side with an entrance to the shop. A continuous roof covers both parallel ranges, with a gablet hip at the left end, and the clock tower protruding.

The tower is weatherboarded and features clocks on the north and southeast elevations. It has a moulded and dentilled cornice, a domed lead roof, a hexagonal cupola with a bell, an ogival metal roof, a ball finial, and an iron weathervane, each displaying the painted inscriptions “V.R. 1887”.

The rear elevation retains a window dating to around 1600, with a single ovolo mullion and two diamond saddle bars with modern diamond leaded glazing. An original doorway with a plain head connects the front to the rear range. Inside the rear range, chamfered axial and transverse beams are visible, along with a 18th-century corner cupboard with a half-round arched head, a spheroid interior, and profiled shelves. There’s a 20th-century grate in a wide wood-burning hearth facing the front, and a similar hearth blocked at the rear. The passage to the right reveals a chamfered beam with plain stops, supported by heavy, square-sectioned joists. The rear wing has similar beams and joists. In the extension, plain, vertically-sectioned joists are jointed to a chamfered axial beam with soffit tenons and diminished haunches; with an altered or re-used wood-burning hearth and a chamfered mantel beam with a lamb’s tongue and notch stop at the right end only. The upper storey was not inspected.

The clock tower was constructed in 1787 to replace a clock that had been on the Corn Market House, which formerly stood in Market Hill and was demolished that year. Restoration work took place in 1887 to commemorate Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee.