The Post Office And Dwelling House Adjoining At South, The Drangway And Part Of Passage To The East Between Church Square And Gibraltar Square

This is an important survival of a richly decorated early 16th-century Cornish townhouse, substantially remodelled in the early 17th century with significant later additions. The complex comprises the Post Office and dwelling house, The Drangway, and part of the passage connecting Church Square and Gibraltar Square.

The original 16th-century building was probably a 3-room cross or through-passage plan structure. The through-passage survives today as the rear of the passage between Church Square and Gibraltar Square, marked by two granite arched doorways. The kitchen was probably located on the site of Gibraltar House, with Gibraltar Square forming the rear courtyard.

In the early 17th century the house underwent significant remodelling. The hall was replaced by a parlour on the ground floor, heated by the original front lateral chimney stack. A grand first-floor room was created above, also heated from the same stack and featuring an elaborate plaster chimneypiece and decorated plaster walls. In the 18th century a wing was added to the south (rear) right, creating an L-shaped plan.

The Post Office and dwelling house adjoining comprises 2 storeys with a 3-window front facing Church Square. The Post Office occupies a shop front with a central front door. The first-floor windows are three 4-pane 20th-century timber sashes, with a gabled attic dormer at the centre. The rear window lighting the former hall retains a granite chamfered lintel and jambs, and was formerly a 3-light mullioned window.

The ground-floor room on the left has a partially blocked fireplace with a chamfered fireplace beam intact behind a 20th-century fireplace. 16th-century linenfold panelling, probably reused from the original build, survives in the window recess. An early 17th-century oak ceiling with boards and a pattern of lozenges in applied moulding continues into the present Post Office ceiling, now painted white. A well to a former newel stair lies to the rear right of the Post Office.

The first-floor room on the left contains the principal decorative feature: an elaborate early 17th-century decorated plaster chimneypiece. This consists of consoles supporting an entablature with plaster vine and rose carving and plaster heads. Above the entablature are two rounded decorated pilasters framing scroll decoration around a central mermaid holding a mirror and probably a comb. The pilasters are built up around wooden posts visible in the attic. The west gable wall in the roofspace is decorated with a pattern of plaster lozenges with ogival wings ornamented with heads and vine carving. The roof trusses have cambered collars mortised into principals and two tiers of trenched purlins, with some evidence of fixing for a barrel ceiling. The roof trusses may predate the plasterwork.

The shop front of the Post Office projects on internal iron columns. The east end of the early 17th-century parlour and room above is now part of The Drangway. The parlour is partitioned between what is now the Post Office and the living accommodation. An inserted ceiling leaves part of the first-floor chimneypiece in the attic, which also contains remains of plaster decoration in the west gable wall.

The Drangway and part of passage to the east between Church Square and Gibraltar Square comprises a house of late 18th-century date, possibly with earlier work to the rear. The front of the house is built of stone rubble to first-floor level, rendered and colourwashed above, with slate hanging and paint on the right return of the front. The front has a hipped slate roof with a brick stack at the west; the rear roof adjoins the Post Office to the west and Gibraltar House to the east.

This section is 2 storeys with a 3-window front. A passageway to Gibraltar Square opens on the front at left. The central front door is under a concrete lintel that continues above a former shop window on the front at right. The first-floor windows to left and right are hornless sashes with 8 panes over 8 panes. The first-floor middle window is a 16-pane fixed window. The interior was not inspected. The passageway to Gibraltar Square has two granite arches. The 16th-century arched doorway halfway through the passageway has moulded jambs and leaves carved in the spandrels. The Drangway was formerly one property with the 16th-century house behind (now the Post Office and dwelling house at south) and was presumably a polite addition to face Church Square.

The building is whitewashed and plastered, probably cob, with a slate roof and brick chimneys. The structure survives with substantial 20th-century alterations.