The Old Palace, Bishop Kings Palace

The Old Palace, also known as Bishop King's Palace, is a substantial timber-framed building with stone sections, dating in part to the 16th and 17th centuries, and with a principal range constructed between approximately 1622 and 1628. It is situated in Bishop Kings Palace, and incorporates elements of an earlier structure. The building comprises two distinct ranges: a main range to the east and an earlier house to the west.

The main range, facing north onto Rose Place and south onto Clark’s Row, is three storeys high and features five gables. The western section has two smaller, lower gables belonging to the earlier 16th-17th century building, with an oversailing upper floor. The east elevation has an embattled parapet and a curved gable in the centre, with three 17th-century single-light stone mullioned windows on the second floor; this elevation is likely older than the 1628 north front. The north elevation’s main range features a doorway with a rectangular fanlight, a three-light window, and a side doorway on the ground floor. First and second floors have five bay windows, though two first-floor windows were removed during a 19th-century alteration on the east side. These oriel windows have four front mullioned, transomed and moulded wood-framed lights and one on each return, each supported by three brackets carved with grotesque figures. The central first-floor window bears the date 1628 on a shield above the grotesques. Moulded fascias above the first-floor windows feature carved arches rising from pendants. The facade of the first and second stories has pargetted decoration. The west range’s second floor has an overhang and two gables; the first floor has a plainer three-light oriel supported by two moulded brackets, and the second floor has a similar oriel with a plain three-light casement window in the west gable. A projecting shop on the north-east angle appears to have been present since 1837-9. The south elevation has been altered, with some windows converted to sashes. The eastern top storey has modern additions, the centre part features an attic, and the western wing has a single gable.

The interior retains contemporary panelling, plaster ceilings, and staircases. Architectural drawings, plans, elevations and sections are documented in the Antiquarian Journal, volume 27 (1947), page 134. The building is part of a group with Nos 82 to 92.