No. 12 And Attached Railings

No. 12 and its attached railings is a house, dating from approximately 1777, and later altered in the 19th and 20th centuries. It was designed by John Wood the Younger and is now used as a day nursery and flats. The front of the building is faced with limestone ashlar, while the rear is rendered. It has a double-pile, mansard roof covered with Welsh slate, and a coped party wall to the left with two ashlar stacks incorporating some early clay pots.

The house is three storeys high, with an attic and basement, and has a three-window front. The first floor has three plate glass sash windows set within splayed, ovolo moulded architraves, featuring friezes and cornices, and lowered moulded stone sills resting on console brackets. The second floor mirrors this design with six/six sash windows and stone sills. On the ground floor, there are two plate glass sash windows with splayed reveals and stone sills to the left, and a six-panel door to the right. The door is contained within a moulded stone doorcase with a cyma moulded architrave, a moulded cornice supported by console brackets, and a hood. A pennant paved crossover, with a wrought iron footscraper flush with the pavement, leads to a small single-pane window in a plain reveal with a stone sill. The basement has six/six sash windows in plain reveals with stone sills, a 20th-century door and glazed screen in an ashlar infilling, and limestone area steps that have been refaced in concrete with a wrought iron handrail. There is a double dormer with horned two/two sash windows. Other external details include a band course over the ground floor, a modillion eaves cornice, and a coped parapet. The rear elevation features two/two and plate glass sashes to the ground and first floors, and six/six sashes with remnants of a 19th-century shutter box.

The basement was inspected by Bath Council in 1982 and contains a fine fireplace surround with classical features, likely added later. Attached to the front are wrought iron railings and a gate with shaped heads on limestone bases. A bronze plaque affixed to the centre of the front ground floor records that Admiral Sir Sydney Smith (1772-1840) lived at the address between 1772 and 1774. Smith's most notable action was off Acre during the Egyptian Campaign of 1799.