Bengough'S Almshouses And Attached Walls, Railings, Balustrades

BRISTOL

ST5873SE HORFIELD ROAD 901-1/11/121 (West side) 31/07/86 Bengough's Almshouses and attached walls, railings, balustrades (Formerly Listed as: HORFIELD ROAD (West side) Bengough's Almhouses with boundary wall and steps)

II

Almshouses. Dated 1878. By Foster and Wood. Brick with limestone dressings, ridge stacks and a hipped double Roman tiled roof. 5 single-depth plan blocks to 3 sides of a courtyard. 2 storeys and basement; 5:3:7:3:5-window ranges. Jacobethan style. Full-width central range with short projecting wings linked to lower side blocks, set to a falling site, with rusticated quoins, plinth band, ground-floor cornice band and first-floor sill bands, and a deep coved cornice. The central range has a pedimented 3-window centre set forward, with recessed central section to a semicircular arch within the pediment with a coffered soffit, containing a large open Jacobean-style porch with attached Ionic columns on panelled pedestals with strapwork above, pulvinated frieze to an open segmental pediment with a good painted cartouche, to a semicircular-arched keyed doorway with double 6-panel doors; the first-floor window above set between banded strips, attached Ionic columns to acanthus brackets and a steep pediment with the centre broken back, inscribed ERECTED 1878/ FOUNDED BY HENRY BENGOUGH 1818, and flanking urns. The lower wings have inner semicircular-arched doorways with attached ball finials, and the lower side blocks have central gabled porches with banded corners, pilasters, to semicircular-arched doorways as the centre. Moulded cross windows have pulvinated friezes and cornices to metal casement, 3-light windows flanking the central porch, with raised panels between the floors. 1-window ends to the street, that to the left has an elliptical carriage arch with panelled jambs. INTERIOR: entrance hall to a central open dogleg stair with turned balusters. SUBSIDIARY FEATURES: attached front walls between the 2 ends have wrought-iron railings with barleysugar stanchions, ball finials and double wrought-iron gates, to central steps up dividing to each side beneath a balustrade with square balusters, ball finials to panelled dies, and railings to the porches. 'A learned pastiche of an unlearned [artisan Dutch Renaissance] style' (Gomme). Part of Bristol's fine group of almshouses. (Gomme A, Jenner M and Little B: Bristol, An Architectural History: Bristol: 1979-: 316; The Builder: London: 386; City of Bristol: City Engineer's Building Grant Plans: Bristol Record Office: 1851-: FOL 83).

Listing NGR: ST5851173434