7, 8 And 9, Chapel Row

Three terrace houses, now with shops on the ground floor, built around 1734 and designed by John Wood the Elder. The buildings are constructed of limestone ashlar with slate roofs.

The three-storey houses, each with an attic and basement, are arranged with three windows per floor. All windows are plain sashes. The second floor windows have eared architraves, while the first floor features architraves and a floating cornice with sills on brackets. A platband with the inscription "CHAPEL ROW" in Roman lettering runs across the façade, though much of it is now concealed by shopfronts.

No. 7 has a single small dormer and a late 19th-century shopfront with three panes, a panelled door under a shallow transom light set in deep reveals to the left, and a simple fascia with thin cornice. The rear of the shop is panelled with later French windows. The west wall retains a niche, original shelves, and traces of original panelling. A large stone fireplace with bracketed mantlepiece survives in the front basement room, and fine raised pine panelling remains in the first floor front room. The rear room also has pine panelling with original cupboards flanking the fireplace, one retaining original pegs for hanging clothes. A panelled dado with Doric colonnettes survives on the staircase. A hanging water closet was present at the rear when inspected by Bath Council in 1982.

No. 8 features a large 20th-century steel casement dormer and a mid-19th-century shopfront surround with windows dated 1874 by Inman and Inman. The shopfront has a deep recessed doorway and a panelled door under a deep transom light to the left, beneath a fascia with modillion cornice, pilasters and brackets. The house served as residence of the Catholic Vicars Apostolic for the Western Districts from around 1786 to 1850, when the Bishopric moved to Clifton. The first floor front room retains unmoulded pine panelling with a blocked fireplace. The rear room also has panelling, though the second floor has lost most of its original panelling and details.

No. 9 has a panelled door in an architrave with floating cornice to the left, and an altered three-pane shopfront of 1891 above two basement louvred vents. The original stairs with Doric colonnettes survive, as does the rear first floor room panelling. Modern doors were installed on the ground floor during renovations in 1995.

All three houses have deep stacks to the right, coped end walls with plain returns, a cornice, shallow blocking course and parapet. The end group is stepped down from the adjoining properties, with the first window bay set very close to the party wall of No. 6.

These houses form part of a relatively low-status row designed by Wood the Elder as part of the western extension of the city. They were first rated in 1734. Although planned as a complete terrace of nine properties, Nos. 7, 8 and 9 show slight differences in detail from Nos. 1-3. The street name derives from a chapel built by Wood nearby, off Queen Square, in 1732 and demolished in 1875.