The Peasant (Formerly The George And Dragon) Public House And 238

The Peasant (formerly The George and Dragon) public house and 238 St John Street

A public house at No. 240 and former dining rooms at No. 238 (now offices), rebuilt around 1889–90 to the design of H J Newton on the site of an earlier pub of the same name. The building has undergone some late 20th-century modification.

The structure is constructed of red rubbed brick with moulded brick and terracotta decoration, painted stone dressings, a timber pub front with cast-iron decoration, granite plinth, and slate roof. It stands on a splayed corner site, rises 3 storeys high plus basement and attic, and comprises 2 bays to the north, 1 bay at the corner, and 3 bays to the south.

The ground floor is now open-plan, while the first floor contains a large function room, now used as a restaurant.

Both the pub and former dining rooms are treated as a single architectural composition. The west elevation to St John Street has 3 bays, with an office entrance in the south bay and the central pub entrance; further entrances serve the north-west corner and the east bay of the north elevation. The pilastered pub front features pedimented entrances with richly ornamented tympana and spandrels and cast-iron window head decoration. Upper lights to windows and entrance fanlights display patterned glazing with bevelled glass. Above the ground floor, bays are divided by pilasters; paired windows are separated by string-courses, with decorative terracotta panels of floral ornament between them. Window arches are formed of gauged bricks with rounded lower edges creating a scalloped effect, and feature decorative terracotta keystones. A moulded stone cornice runs between the first and second floors. At the top, a moulded stone cornice and balustraded parapet is crowned by a central semi-circular pediment to the west elevation and a matching pediment to the east bay of the north elevation. The pediments contain dormers with round-headed windows and stone relief decoration incorporating roundels bearing a figure of St George. The corner bay is surmounted by a dormer set in an aedicule with a clock and weathervane. Timber sash windows are employed throughout; those to the first floor have additional top-hung pivoting upper lights. The roof is a slated mansard with decorative iron cresting to No. 238. Moulded brick chimney stacks rise through it.

The ground-floor pub retains a central curved bar, altered at the west end, with a bar back featuring glazed patterned fanlights. A decorative mosaic floor runs throughout, bearing the original pub name "The George and Dragon" in the former lobby area at the north-east entrance. A coloured tiled panel to the left of this entrance depicts St George slaying the dragon, restored after Second World War bomb damage. Relief-pattern tiled dado work below may continue beneath modern timber dado to the rear; the mosaic tile floor also incorporates a scene of St George slaying the dragon. The east part of the bar is finished with a fibrous plaster ceiling of intersecting circles. A stair on the rear (south) wall has turned balusters. The first-floor restaurant features a decorative plaster cornice and window architraves decorated with paterae. The second floor was not inspected. The interior of No. 238 was not inspected but is known to be extensively altered at ground-floor level.

Originally named The George and Dragon, the pub was rebuilt and enlarged around 1889–90 on the site of an earlier pub of the same name, which had previously been called The Green Dragon. The 1893 Post Office directory lists No. 238 as dining rooms run by Charles Cousins and No. 240 as The George and Dragon, run by Charles Taylor. Although No. 238 was designed as a unified composition with No. 240, it appears always to have been in separate ownership.

This is a handsome, well-detailed example of a late 19th-century public house with high-quality brickwork, a good pub front, and some original internal pub fittings and decoration of note. No. 238, although internally altered, forms an integral part of the design and is included principally on the grounds of external architectural interest.