9, 11 AND 13, ST MATTHEW'S ROAD

A terrace of three houses at 9, 11, and 13 St Matthew’s Road, Torquay, dating to the late 1850s and early 1860s. The houses are built with plastered walls, gabled slate roofs, and rendered stacks with bracketed cornices. They are arranged on a mirror plan, with the outer end houses having entrances on their returns, flanking a central house with a symmetrical design and central doorway.

The front facade is a seven-window arrangement, symmetrical in design, with deep eaves and verges supported by brackets and banding along the eaves and verges. A platband runs along the first floor. The windows are 4-pane sashes with horizontal glazing bars. The outer bays project forward and are gabled, while bays 3 and 5 are slightly broken forward and also gabled, all with rusticated quoins. Ground-floor windows in the outer bays have proud architraves with floating cornices on consoles and sunk panels below; other bays feature tripartite sashes. The central doorway to number 11 is round-headed. First-floor windows in bays 2 and 6 have moulded architraves and pilasters; windows 3 and 5 are round-headed. A plain, square-headed window is located in the slightly recessed centre bay. A verandah with a tent roof supported by trellis standards extends across the central five bays.

The three-bay returns also project forward and are gabled in the centre, with round-headed doorways, a round-headed window above, and shallow projecting stacks in the outer bays. The interior has not been inspected, but may contain features of interest. The houses are located overlooking St Matthew's Church, and are adjacent to later villas arranged around a green.