Unicorn House

BURY ST EDMUNDS

TL8664NW EASTGATE STREET 639-1/5/343 (North side) 12/07/72 No.57 Unicorn House (Formerly Listed as: EASTGATE STREET (North side) No.61)

GV II

Former public house, now a house. Late C15/early C16; late C20 modernised exterior and rear extensions. Timber-framed and rendered; pantiles. EXTERIOR: 2 storeys and cellar, partly above ground; now a 3-cell plan with internal chimney-stack. 3 window range: small-paned C20 casements to the upper storey, the 2 outer windows 2-light, the central window 3-light with a narrow middle light. On the ground storey one 2-light casement window with top lights and 2 fixed small-pane windows with top-opening lights. A window within the high plinth at pavement level lights the cellar. On the west gable a square C20 bay with a gabled pantiled roof and 3 small-paned windows. Entry now at the rear. INTERIOR: extensive cellar, with walling of large kidney flints, now modernised and part of the living area. Timbers exposed in parts of interior. The frame is in 4 bays with a 3-cell plan, the remains of a cross-entry and an internal chimney-stack with 2 back-to-back hearths. The hall is in one long bay and there is no bay for the chimney which appears inserted. One open fireplace has a large cambered and roll- moulded lintel. The house has undergone considerable changes: signs of charring and smoke-blackening on the upper timbers suggest a former open hall, but the clasped purlin roof is unblackened. Tension braces in one cross-wall; one tie-beam and post have empty mortices for arched braces. The 2 eastern bays have C17 ceiling joists. Curious drawings in red ochre on the plaster within the roof space may be of windmills.

Listing NGR: TL8618064667