2 Friar's Street and 40 Market Hill

2 Friar's Street and 40 Market Hill

This is a former 17th-century inn with an adjoining medieval hall house that has been substantially altered during the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, and converted to shops and flats in the early 21st century.

The building is constructed of timber frame with wattle and daub panels, rendered and painted pale grey. The roof is covered with slate over the south end and red clay tiles over the north end.

The building forms part of an east-facing terrace on the west side of Friar's Street where it joins Market Hill to the north, and includes a long rear wing.

The southern part of the building, now occupied by Javelin with flats above, comprises two storeys and an attic. The low pitched roof is not visible from the street, except for a tall brown brick chimney stack on the left-hand side, which dates to the 19th century or earlier. The first floor is lit by two eight-over-eight pane sash windows with slender glazing bars. The attic floor is lit by two four-over-four pane sashes in moulded surrounds positioned immediately under the eaves. An old pub sign for The Anchor hangs between the first-floor windows.

The larger northern part, now occupied by Askew's with flats above, has two storeys and an attic beneath a rebuilt gambrel roof with a red brick chimney stack just below the ridge on the left-hand side. The two parts share the same eaves line, but the north part has higher ceilings and a much higher roof. On the first floor it is lit by three windows: the first is a pair of vertical two-over-two pane sashes set within a moulded surround with a wide central mullion, followed by two six-over-six pane sashes in a moulded surround. This fenestration appears to be of 19th-century date. The attic is lit by two early 21st-century gabled dormers wholly within the roof space. A late 20th-century shopfront with timber fascia boards spans the front of the building.

The rear elevation of the south part has a 20th-century fire escape leading to a first-floor door in a small extension. The left part of the elevation is obscured by the two-storey rear wing, which has a steeply pitched roof and is faced in brick on the ground floor and plastered on the first floor, painted pale grey overall. The south elevation has a 20th-century vertical plank door and irregular fenestration on both floors, mostly of 20th-century date. The north side of the rear wing is said to retain some early pargetted plaster, and the rear (west) elevation of the north part of the building was not accessible for inspection.

Interior

The interior has been greatly altered and now consists of ground-floor shops with flats above. Much of the surviving timber framing is obscured. An isometric sketch of the exposed framing in the north part was made during post-fire restoration before it was again covered up. This part demonstrates good quality carpentry with moulded main timbers and evidence for the location of original doors and windows. The two-bay structure has a jettied frontage, corner posts and wall plate, but no other surviving framing of the east (front) wall. The north wall has close studding on both floors, a mid-rail and at first-floor level diagonal bracing from each corner post to the central post. The rear gallery, which provided access via staircases to the first-floor rooms, retains close-studding with diagonal bracing between the posts along the rear wall. The front wall of the gallery retains posts indicating the position of two former openings into the rooms on the first floor, which has an east-west bridging beam and north-south tie-beam. On the ground floor a 17th-century plank and muntin screen, designed as a draught screen rather than a structural partition, which divided the room into two equal halves, was moved against the north end wall during the restoration.

The main area of painted decoration exposed after the fire is associated with a first-floor room of the former inn on the north gable end. It is carried on lime hair plaster applied across the timber frame and daub infill, and the studs are keyed for plaster. More than one scheme of decoration exists in this area, but the primary scheme consists of a top border containing a hunting scene with figures on horseback and one on foot. A narrow band contains text and the date '…Lord to remaine ANNO DOMMINI: 1630'. Below are a fox and an ape and possibly a cockerel interspersed in rich foliage and flowers. The bottom band is in grey. A reddish-brown colour is applied on top of this scheme. A row of tenterhooks is visible on the tie-beam above, indicating that a textile was hung in this room. There is evidence for 17th-century painted decoration in the former gallery, particularly on the west and east walls. In the ground-floor room below contains extensive remains of grey and black paint on the timbers. All of these painted schemes are covered over with protective boarding.

In the south part of the building there is some exposed timber framing, including a substantial jowled post and chamfered bridging beams on the ground floor, but it is very fragmentary. In the rear wing the ground-floor room at the west end has a roughly chamfered bridging beam and joists. The close-studding on the front wall frame is exposed at first-floor level, as is the wall plate. The bay division at the end has a cambered tie-beam supported on jowled posts with down bracing on the south end. There is a substantial tie-beam to the west of this, also supported by posts.