North Road House

North Road House is a Greek Revival villa built in 1827–28 as the private residence of the architect Thomas Smith. The house was altered in the mid 19th century and underwent repairs in 1915–16 following bomb damage. It is constructed of stucco on the south elevation and yellow stock brick on the remaining elevations, with a parapet concealing low-pitched Welsh slated hipped roofs.

The exterior comprises a basement and two storeys. The south elevation displays five sash windows with glazing bars, recessed in moulded architrave surrounds and grouped 2:1:2. The basement is plain-stuccoed as a plinth, the ground floor is rusticated with a moulded band at first-floor level picking up the line of the cornice on the projecting porch. The first floor features plain stucco with a moulded cornice and parapet stepped up at the centre. The central porch stands above four stone steps and is formed of two fluted Greek Doric columns with responds, a full entablature with triglyph frieze, cornice with mutules, and a blocking course. A four-panel front door occupies the centre.

The garden (north) elevation is constructed of yellow stock brickwork in Flemish bond with a stone band at first-floor level and moulded stucco cornice and parapet continuing from the south elevation. The first floor contains three windows: two outer sashes with glazing bars and a centre six-light mullion and transom window with timber casements and divided glazing, all recessed under segmental brick arches. The ground floor features two outer full-length triple sashes with 1:3:1-pane subdivision by glazing bars, recessed under segmental brick arches, and twin glazed French windows with large-pane glazing bars in the centre.

The house is raised above its basement, concealed by two terraces on the garden elevation, which formed an integral part of the original design. The upper terrace is constructed of large Penrhyn slate slabs supported on a brick offset of the house wall and rebated on sandstone ashlar slabs forming the outer edge. Two square Penrhyn slate planting tubs on castors, apparently original, stand on the upper terrace. A central flight of five stone steps descends to the lower terrace, with a planted bed at lower level concealing a service undercroft beneath the upper terrace. The lower terrace was repaved in brick during the 1930s, though the Penrhyn slate edging above the stucco-faced outer wall appears original. A further flight of five stone steps, flanked by two mid 19th-century artificial stone urn planters, leads to garden level. An east service wing was demolished by bomb damage in 1915, with only the basement remaining. A single-storey flat-roofed mid 19th-century vestibule with a 1930s garden room links to a former mid 19th-century coach house, now converted to a separate residential unit in the 1980s and of no special interest.

The interior is arranged with a central through hall on the ground floor, with principal reception rooms either side above the service basement, formerly including the kitchen. The hall is divided into five bays with quadripartite plaster vaulting featuring raised beads on groins and acanthus leaf rosettes. Bays are separated by elliptical arches with raised guilloche ornament on the entrados, carried on foliated consoles with egg-and-dart-ornamented capitals. At the garden end is an elliptical vault divided into seven panels, each decorated with honeysuckle ornament by raised flat bands. Twin French casements with two-light fanlights open to the terrace outside, flanked by pilasters with acanthus and egg-and-dart caps. Deep skirtings with scotia mouldings run throughout the ground floor. Doors have four fielded panels.

The drawing room, located right rear off the hall, features an elaborate cornice, possibly mid 19th-century, with egg-and-dart, hollow acanthus and running garlands. The fireplace wall has twin elliptical recesses either side of the chimney breast, with guilloche ornamented intrados and console supports similar to those in the hall but later. An Egyptian-style white marble fireplace features attached Lotus plant columns. Double doors, each with large and small leafs, each large leaf having three large panels with grooved 'Soane' surrounds and scotia mouldings.

The dining room features an elaborate plaster cornice with acanthus leaves, rolls and square band and hollow roll. A late 19th-century red granite fireplace with bolection mouldings was installed in the mid 1950s, reputedly from the sale preceding the demolition of Panshanger House outside Hertford in 1954.

A narrow dogleg staircase with stick balusters, curtail step and wreathed hardwood handrails serves the upper floor. Leaded-light obscure-glazed half-landing windows were installed around 1915–16 as reparation for bomb damage. First-floor bedrooms contain plain fireplaces, several of which have been removed. A bathroom to the right of the staircase head was refitted around 1936 and contains a recessed eau-de-nil enamelled bath with etched reeded-pattern Vitrolite panelling above and eau-de-nil Vitrolite surround with twin mirror-faced closet doors either side. An eau-de-nil ceramic splashback and matching vanity table complete the scheme.

Thomas Smith (1799–1875) practised in Hertford from the 1820s and served as County Surveyor for Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire. Among his Hertford buildings is the County Hospital on North Road. In the early 20th century, North Road House (formerly known as Paynters) was the home of Annie Swan from approximately 1908 to 1935. Swan was a social activist and prolific popular author who moved from Hampstead to Hertford with her doctor husband. In her autobiography, My Life (London, 1924), she provided a vivid account of bomb damage to the house during a Zeppelin raid on 13 October 1915, in which the east wing was demolished, the front door was blown out, and the dining room was stripped to lath and plaster.