41 and 41a, Broad Street

41 and 41A Broad Street is a house that has been converted into a shop. It dates from the early 18th century and may have been a refronting of an older asymmetrical house. The shopfront was altered in the mid-19th century, with further changes made in 1876 and the 20th century.

The building features a limestone ashlar facade, with a rubble-stone return on the right side and a 20th-century slate roof that creates a new attic storey, although it was likely originally three storeys and an attic. The structure is double depth.

The exterior consists of two storeys with an attic and has a four-window front. A banded pilaster rises to a moulded capital on the left party wall, indicating that the house was formerly three storeys high, with evidence of this third storey still visible in 1912. The building has a slightly returned coped parapet, stopped cornices on the first and ground floors, and banded pilasters at the quoins. The first-floor six-over-six pane sash windows have moulded architraves and sills, with keystones reaching the cornice and panelled aprons. To the left of the centre, there is a bay that steps slightly forward, flanked by fluted pilasters with moulded consoles supporting an open pediment. Below this, there is a tall opening with moulded arises, flanked by Ionic pilasters with exaggerated entasis on tall plinths. The 19th-century half-glazed shop door features a tall overlight. To the left, there is a cornice and fascia above a projecting canted two-pane shop window, while to the right, there is a cornice on moulded pilasters with elaborate consoles above a fascia and a four-pane shop window. Both shop windows have semi-elliptical heads with two overlights above each pane.

The interior has not been inspected recently, but it is noted to have good original fielded panelling in the first-floor rooms and part of a turned baluster staircase.

This distinctive elevation may be attributed to William Killigrew and is an important example of the architectural styles that were popular at the time of John Wood's arrival in Bath. The attic storey was added in 1973.