17-23, St Andrew Street

Nos. 17-23 St Andrew Street, Hertford

A range of shops and storage occupying what was originally a late 15th-century hall house, subsequently extended and subdivided into tenements with shops, and heavily altered in the 17th, 19th, and 20th centuries.

The building is timber-framed and plastered, with the left (east) flank weatherboarded. The roof is old tiled with a grey-brown brick chimneystack at the left (east) and a square red brick chimneystack with band and four long orange pots on the ridge in the centre. It presents as a two-bay Wealden hall house with storeyed bays to left and right, extended eastwards by one bay, rising to two storeys and attics.

The first floor features four irregularly spaced flush-set sash windows of different sizes (20:12:12:12:16 pane lights). A jettied overhang with brackets runs across the front, with 19th and 20th-century shopfronts and shop windows occupying the ground floor. No. 17 has two plate glass closed windows with central mullion flanked by pilasters, with the head of a former bow window above and a half-glazed door to the right. No. 19 has a timber-framed plate glass closed window and a half-glazed door in the position of the former hall entrance. No. 21 displays a closed plate glass window on the left, a 20th-century glazed door, and a 20th-century square plate glass oriel window carried on cut brackets on the right. No. 23 has a door with upper glazed panel and panelled fanlight with pierced vent above, alongside a late 19th-century plate glass window in a heavy timber frame on the right.

The rear elevation is much altered and extended, featuring a broad timber-framed pebbledashed two-storey wing at the left behind No. 23, a lean-to extension behind No. 19, and a slated catslide roof at the rear of No. 17.

Internally, timber framing and studwork are exposed within each individual unit. No. 17 contains a central chamfered and tongue-stopped beam with the rear wall removed. The attic shows evidence of roof raising, with the original arrangement appearing to have had windbracing (now removed). Spreading of the roof necessitated the installation of wrought-iron tie rods in the 19th century.

Exposed heavy studwork in the party wall with No. 19 at first-floor level indicates the outer wall of the east cross wing.

No. 19 contains the structure of the east cross wing and a 17th-century inserted chimneystack. The ground floor has mortices for studs, a three-light window, and downward curving bracing in the wall plate beneath the jetty adjoining a heavy jowled post, which appears to have had the original front door immediately to the west. A cambered tie beam with mortices for arch bracing at first-floor level suggests the first floor was originally open to the hall below.

No. 21 is double-fronted and contained the two-bay hall. The ground floor retains some 17th-century panelling and a very heavy post for the central truss, heavily moulded on both post and tie beam, visible on an inserted chamber floor. This post has been much cut back to create headroom, and the arch braces are largely missing except for a small portion. An inserted stack has three canted arched fireplaces on the first floor.

No. 23 contains the west storeyed wing with two blocked doorways. The roof structure of the whole block was raised in the 17th century to create additional first-floor headroom and attics. The upper roof structure above the attics is not accessible.