The Olde White Hart Hotel

The Olde White Hart Hotel is a building of mixed dates, originally a house and later a public house, now a hotel, situated adjacent to the former site of the Chapel of St Botolph. The core of the building dates to the 15th century, with alterations made in the 16th century, and a front and a two-storey rear extension added in the 19th century. The building is timber-framed, with some parts rendered and faced with painted brick. The south gable end is weatherboarded, and the roof is covered in plain tiles with a shallow rear slope.

The exterior has two storeys, attic space, and a cellar. It features a three-window front with small-paned sliding sashes on the first floor and sashes with a single vertical glazing bar on the ground floor, set in shallow reveals with segmental arched heads. The doorcase has panelled pilasters and reveals, topped by a flat cornice hood supported on cut brackets. An internal chimney stack has three attached hexagonal shafts set diagonally on a square base.

The cellar, beneath the 19th-century rear range, is vaulted brick with walling in panels of kidney flint and brick dressings. The interior is complex, showing evidence of several stages of development. A lower wallplate runs along the front and part of the rear walls and contains housings for missing tie-beams, suggesting a medieval range, although some of the plates have been replaced. A later medieval alteration created a three-bay cross-wing at the north end, and this form remains visible internally. The ground floor ceilings are high, with heavy, plain joists and chamfered main beams, the middle beam supported by short, solid, arched braces. There are replaced joists in the rear bay, and housings for a two-light diamond-mullioned window in the rear wall. A doorway with a shallow arched head is now blocked by an inserted chimney stack with back-to-back hearths on the ground and first floors, featuring surrounds that include re-used stone. A timber-framed addition from the 16th century is located in the southern end bay. The former end wall retains part of a wide continuous sill for a long window in the gable end. Only the side purlins of an apparently later roof are visible in the attics.