The Angel Hotel

The Angel Hotel is a Grade II* listed hotel and former posting house situated on the north side of Guildford High Street. The building is a palimpsest of medieval, early modern, and later additions, with a 13th-century undercroft below a timber-framed house of 16th and 17th-century date, re-clad in the 19th century and extended to the rear around a courtyard in the late 19th and 20th centuries.

The principal front comprises a three-storey, three-windowed range to the left and a two-storey, two-windowed range to the right. The undercroft is constructed in chalk and brick. Above, the timber frame is exposed on the right-hand return front, while the front elevation is finished in colourwashed stucco with a stone-coped parapet obscuring hipped plain tiled roofs which end-on to the street. Slate roofs cover the rear ranges. Vermiculated-block end pilasters and an eaves cornice ornament the composition. The three-bay left range features 19th-century 12-pane glazing-bar sash windows on the first and second floors, set in projecting architrave surrounds with corbelled sills. An S-section iron balcony runs across the first floor and extends to the right-hand range. The rusticated ground floor contains two tripartite glazing-bar sash windows beneath voussoir heads, with a basement window to the left where the ground slopes away. Double doors to the centre are set under a flat cornice hood supported on Doric pilasters.

The right-hand range has three 12-pane glazing-bar sash windows on the first floor over a through-way to the courtyard below, spanned by an elliptical arch with keystone and chamfered piers. The right-hand return wall facing the through-way exposes the timber frame with whitewashed brick infill, showing braced main posts and wide joists over the end bay. A Jacobean-style main lintel on the left wall of the through-way is decorated with lozenge panels. One double-bay arcade to the right, now filled in with leaded glass and strapwork decoration, is flanked by Jacobean Ionic baluster pilasters with block band and lozenge decorations.

Late 19th and 20th-century ranges surround a cobbled courtyard to the rear, mostly executed in imitation timber-frame style with projecting gables and a first-floor balcony across the northern (rear) range. This rear range contains a passage providing access to North Street.

The interior features exposed framing throughout, though some is imitation and much has been re-used. The entrance hall is fitted with a 20th-century timber and panelled gallery around its sides, a deep fireplace at one end, and a blocked 4-light mullioned window in a side wall. The roof structure is complex, incorporating wind-bracing and braced collar trusses.

The 13th-century undercroft is a notable survival, constructed in chalk and stone with six bays of quadripartite rib vaulting carried on round piers and wall corbels, the centre piers having stepped plinths. The Angel's undercroft is exceptional in retaining an internal staircase to the floor above, and it appears to be unique in having no direct access from the main High Street. The principal entrance was originally from the rear of the building. Two windows were originally built in the front wall facing the High Street; one was removed in 1939 and originally consisted of two chamfered pointed lights.