274 AND 276, HIGH STREET

Nos 274 and 276 on High Street is a house that has been converted into estate agents and offices. It dates from the mid-18th century, with early 19th-century alterations and extensions added around 1881. The building is constructed of red brick and covered in colourwashed stucco, featuring a plain tiled roof at the front that is hidden by a tall parapet. The later extensions at the sides and rear have hipped slate roofs.

The structure is two storeys high with an attic, topped with a cornice and parapet that includes end newels, channelled angle piers, and a rusticated ground floor on a smooth-rendered plinth. There are corbelled stacks on both the left and right sides. The front has three bays with a steep central pediment. The attic features three 6-pane sash windows set in raised architrave surrounds, with keystones on the outer windows and a scrolled keystone in the center, supported by scrolled corbels beneath the sills. The first floor has three 12-pane glazing-bar sash windows in lugged architrave surrounds, each with pediment hoods; the outer hoods are segmental while the central one is triangular, adorned with modillions and scrolls flanking a frieze, with foliage garlands hanging from the scrolls.

The ground floor has square plate glass windows with half-oval traceried fans above. The central entrance door has four panels with a traceried and glazed top panel beneath a fanlight, all framed by a keystoned voussoir surround. The right-hand return front has two windows with projecting surrounds, positioned at different levels, indicating the extensions and alterations made over time. A later 19th-century wing is set back to the right, featuring a cross-ridge stack and a hip-roofed dormer, with moulded eaves at the base of the parapet and plate glass sash windows. The ground floor shop extensions and 20th-century additions at the rear are not of special interest.

Inside, there is a large staircase in the style of the early 18th century, along with some door and window surrounds from the same period.