9, 10 And 11, Northgate Street

House, now divided into three properties, comprising buildings at 9, 10 and 11 Northgate Street in Bury St Edmunds. The structure dates from the 14th and 15th centuries, with alterations and extensions added in the 17th and 18th centuries. The buildings were divided into two and refronted in 1823. The construction is part timber-framed and part flint-walled, with red brick added during 18th-century changes and white brick applied as the outer facing. The roofs are slated.

The exterior presents as two storeys with cellars to part of the structure. The long street frontage is unified in appearance. A central gable with rusticated brick quoins projects over a shallow tetrastyle Doric portico built on a stone stylobate. The two flanking ranges have wide modillion eaves soffits. The fenestration comprises seven windows arranged in groups of three, one, and three. The outer ranges each contain 12-pane sash windows in plain reveals with flat gauged arches. The central gable features a large canted three-light oriel bay with a 12-pane sash window flanked by two narrower eight-pane sashes. Three four-panel entrance doors sit within the portico, each with raised fielded panels. The two outer doors have rectangular fanlights with arched Gothic tracery, while the middle door serves No.10, has two leaves, and is topped by an ogee-headed fanlight also in Gothic style.

The rear range of No.9 dates from the 17th century and features twin rendered gables with original bargeboards ornamented with dentils and guilloche work. An 18th-century half-glazed rear door with heavy glazing bars has an eared architrave to its doorcase and a flat cornice hood on brackets. The long rear range of No.10 has exposed flint walling along part of the north side and a section of red brick with blue headers, with 18th-century red brick replacement on the south side. No.11 has a long tiled rear range extending down Pump Lane: partly single-storey and partly raised to two storeys, with brick on the ground storey and render above. One Edwardian mullion-and-transom two-light upper window on the main rear wall has cusped heads to the lights.

Interior arrangements are complex and overlapping between Nos 9 and 10 on both storeys. The 14th-century front range of No.9 is the oldest section. Three timber-framed bays survive, originally associated with an open hall, which was replaced in the late 14th century when the rear range of No.10 was built. Little framing is exposed within No.9, but part of the smoke-blackened upper framing from the south end wall of its former hall remains visible in the room above the entrance porch, now part of No.10. Between the entrance hall of No.9 and an adjoining plainly panelled room stands a thick flint and stone wall. At the rear of the entrance hall is a stone porch which formerly opened into the cross-entry of the later open hall now forming part of No.10. Three doorways in the porch have shallow pointed arches. Above it is a timber ceiling with very heavy plain joists, and the small room above has square Jacobean panelling topped by a fine ornate 17th-century plaster frieze. A 17th-century dog-leg stair in the rear range has pierced splat balusters. The 14th-century front range has a crown-post roof.

A corridor from the front leads to the late 14th-century three-bay rear hall, now the principal part of No.10 and still open to tie-beam level. The south wall was realigned in the 18th century and rebuilt in brick. At the west end stands an inserted 16th-century fireplace with a four-centred arch and varied carved decoration, partly Jacobean and partly reproduction in early 16th-century style. The walls contain various sections of square Jacobean panelling. At the east end, an open Jacobean screen surmounted by a gallery marks the original cross-entry position, which linked with the stone porch now part of No.9. Against the north wall are two flights of late 17th-century stairs, extensively restored, featuring pierced splat balusters, ornate lantern newels and moulded handrails; one flight leads to the gallery, the other to the rest of No.10 which sits at a higher level. The tie-beams and cornice of the hall are moulded with deep hollows, filleted rolls and brattishing. The crown-post roof has housings in the centre for a louvre to draw off smoke from the open hearth.

West of the hall is a parlour now with complete Jacobean panelling, some reproduction work. Below it is a two-bay cellar with heavy unchamfered joists and a chamfered main beam with broach stops. Further west, two bays were extensively remodelled and raised in the 18th century. The ground storey ceilings are very high with tall sash windows on the south; a panelled dado and wood modillion cornice line the walls; a fireplace has an eared architrave. In the attics and upper storey of the raised section, remains of crown-post roofs are visible along with timber-framed gable-end walls of the open hall featuring multiple bracing. The whole rear range beyond the open hall has been widened along the north side and contains corridors and an Edwardian stair in Jacobean style. The upper framing along the original north wall is now exposed internally. The front range of No.11, formerly The Swan Inn, appears to be an early 19th-century rebuilding with no visible earlier features, containing moulded plaster cornices and six-panel doors, a winder stair with stick balusters and wreathed handrail. A long 18th-century rear range down Pump Lane, partly originally single-storey, has exposed main beams.