Nos. 21-27 (Consec) And Attached Railings And Gates

Seven terrace houses on the north side of Great Pulteney Street, built around 1790 by Thomas Baldwin, John Eveleigh and other architects.

The houses are constructed in limestone ashlar with double pitched slate mansard roofs featuring dormers and moulded stacks set against coped party walls, many retaining hand-thrown chimneystacks. Each house is three storeys tall with attics and basements, presenting a three-window range to the street.

The exterior displays a continuous coped parapet (now partly removed), modillion cornice, frieze and fascia, and moulded string courses to the second and first floors. All windows are six-pane sash type. The ground floor features a platband moulded base with chamfered rustication and radial voussoirs to flat arches, a plinth, and raised fielded panels to eight-panel doors positioned to the left with large overlights. The upper floors are irregularly articulated by a giant order of fluted Corinthian columns.

Number 21, positioned to the left, is stepped forward and pedimented. Its first floor contains a semicircular arched window with radial glazing bars and a cornice on consoles, double festoons flanked by paterae to the frieze, with three windows to the ground floor. The left return in Sunderland Street has a coped parapet and ground floor banded pilasters, while steps lead up to an enclosed porch with dentil cornice. Clasping pilasters flank margin lights with wrought iron grilles, and the door is flanked by engaged columns with foliate capitals.

Number 22 is stepped back with quarter and full pilasters. Its pedimented first floor right-hand window is flanked by paired pilasters with consoles and paterae, with a triple festoon between.

Number 23 has a pilaster to the left of centre and semicircular timber glazing bars to the overlight.

Number 24 features margin panes and beaded circular and quadrant glazing bars to the overlight.

Numbers 25, 26 and 27 have crown glass cobweb fanlights within overlights. Number 27 additionally has balconettes to the first floor and a quarter pilaster to the right angle.

Interiors have been recorded during inspections. Number 21 features a red, cream and patterned ceramic tiled floor in the hall, a stone staircase with modified balustrades and original narrow veneered handrail, and fine architraving and marble fireplaces throughout, including a very fine fireplace with cherubs and reeding on the second floor. Number 24 retains original ceilings, a side board recess with elliptical arches, a cantilevered stone staircase with square banisters and mahogany handrail, and white Regency marble fireplaces on the first floor. Number 26 contains highly decorative gesso friezes and plaster cornices, with a ground floor dining room featuring an original stripped fireplace with green and white marble surround and cast iron grate decorated with a cupid and seated figure. The cantilevered stone staircase has inset stone treads, a mahogany handrail, and decorative puddle iron casting banisters. The ground floor parlour has an original painted wood fireplace decorated with musical instruments, Prince of Wales feathers, swags and garlands, while the first floor drawing room wall frieze features vases linked by festoons and ribbons with elliptical flower patterns. The second floor front bedroom retains two original doors with lock boxes and sliding latches, and an original sixteen-panel wooden screen on the landing. Number 27 has a white Sicilian marble fireplace with cupids either side and stone cantilevered stairs. Number 29 (listed as part of this group) retains its original ceiling with fluted frieze and rosettes, an early 19th-century fanlight and original cornices with fluted chair rail, plus a fine Victorian fireplace on the first floor and original Georgian fireplace on the third floor.

The terrace is fronted by square-section railings with urn finials, vases above plinths, and gates to basement areas. Some 19th-century boot scrapers survive.

Great Pulteney Street forms the principal element of the late 18th-century development of the Bathwick estate east of the River Avon. Laid out on an unusually generous scale of 100 feet wide, it is one of the most imposing urban set-pieces of its day in Britain. Robert Adam prepared designs in 1782, but Thomas Baldwin was responsible for the eventual design. Leases were granted from 1788, though progress was delayed by the building crash of the mid-1790s. Number 21, formerly a school, was subdivided into flats in 1980. Number 27 was subdivided in 1973. Number 21 was listed for sale unfinished in September 1794 following the bankruptcy of developers Messrs. Lowther.