King William and Naval Volunteer Public Houses

Row of three houses, now public house and restaurant, on King Street in Bristol. Dating from around 1670 with 18th-century fenestration and late 20th-century restoration.

The buildings are constructed with rendered timber box frame, brick lateral and valley stacks, and pantile roof. They present gabled fronts to the road with right-hand stacks and right-hand central stairs between front and back rooms. Number 20 includes a single-storey wing linked to a 17th-century back block. The row is two storeys with attic and basement, arranged across a five-window range. The three gables have jettied floors with fascia boards and pent roofs to each floor, with pent roofs also above the attic windows of Numbers 19 and 20.

The ground floors feature early 19th-century public house frontage. Number 18 has a left-hand door with rectangular metal batswing fanlight and 6-panel door, with two large 6/6-pane sashes. Number 19 retains an 18th-century ground floor with four scrolled brackets above panelled pilasters, outer doorways with reeded architrave to the right (with 3-pane overlight and 6-panel door, bottom pair flush), a similar left-hand doorway, and two horned 6/6-pane sashes between. Number 20 has an 18th-century shop front with reeded surrounds and roundels, a right-hand doorway with a 17th-century door frame to the left featuring moulded stops and Tudor arch, 3-pane overlight and framed studded 9-panel door with decorative panels to the top rail, and a 10/10-pane sash above a segmental-arched cellar opening.

Fenestration varies across the row. Number 18 has a two-storey canted oriel with pilaster jambs to the first floor, 17th-century casements with glazing bars, and an attic 6/6-pane sash in a flush frame. Number 19 has 6/6-pane sashes in flush frames and a four-light mullion and transom attic casement. Number 20 has 18th-century 8/8-pane first-floor sashes, 12/12-pane second-floor sashes, and paired attic 8/8-pane sashes, all in flush frames.

The right return features two lateral stacks with a one-window range between lighting the stairs. A ground-floor 6/6-pane sash lights this staircase, with 17th-century three-light mullion casements above (with transom on the first floor) and a small 2-pane light beneath the eaves. A single stack sits in the valley between Numbers 18 and 19.

To the rear of Number 20, a two-storey back block and single-storey linking wing have hipped roofs. Recent buildings are attached to the rear of Numbers 18 and 19.

Internally, Numbers 19 and 20 are interconnected. They contain central right-hand newel framed stairs with uncut string, newels with moulded finials and pendents, moulded rails and splat balusters with Ionic capitals on the ground floor. Moulded beams run through the first floor with panelled soffits and bar chamfer stops, running into a continuous timber overmantel to the rear of Number 19 above a bolection-moulded fire surround. The side wall of Number 20 has a Jacobean stone fire surround with architrave, panels above and brackets to a cornice. An attic door to Number 20 is scratch-moulded with nine panels, the top ones arched. The back block has exposed beams and a restored stair.

Number 18 has a panelled ground floor with bolection mouldings and a continuous overmantel and fire surround with an eared architrave and rocaille reliefs to the front.

King Street was developed on the south side from 1663. Like the Llandoger Trow, these houses form an early type of terrace retaining original plan forms. The rear back block is an important survival, with parallels in other south-western towns such as Barnstaple and Totnes.