2-10, Church Street

This is a uniform terrace of five double-fronted houses located on Church Street in Tiverton. They were likely built between 1875 and 1876, following a pattern established in the late 1850s with the houses on St Paul Street. The terrace extends from Heathcoat Square to Wellbrook Street and ties in with the building at number 14 Wellbrook Street.

The houses are constructed from pinkish-yellow brick in a Flemish bond pattern, with a low, chamfered plinth of squared stone blocks. All window and door openings, except for a round-arched passage entrance at the right-hand end of number 6, feature flat gauged arches. The windows have cast-iron sills and the roofs are slate-covered. Chimneys built of matching brick extend up party walls and originally had projecting courses forming entablatures; these have been heightened with red brick. They are fitted with good spiked chimneypots.

The terrace plan is double-fronted, with variations at the corner houses (numbers 2 and 10) and at number 6, which incorporates an open passage running through it. Number 2 has its doorway facing the entrance to Heathcoat Square.

The external appearance is of two storeys, with three-window fronts and a central doorway. Number 2 has a fourth window facing Church Street, while numbers 6 and 10 have their doors set into the left-hand bay. Number 10’s third window is rounded onto Wellbrook Street. Doorways feature deep, wood-panelled reveals and soffits with incised Greek decoration, topped with three-paned fanlights. The doors are four-panelled, with the lower panels flush and fitted with cast-iron knockers and letterboxes, although numbers 8 and 10 have been altered to feature 20th-century flush wooden doors. The round-arched passage-way at number 6 includes a good iron gate at the rear, with evidence of hinges for a similar gate at the front. All windows are 8-paned sashes.

The corners of the block are rounded and recessed, with the end bay to the right (part of number 2) slightly splayed. A deeply projecting, moulded eaves-cornice runs along the roofline, and rainwater pipes are recessed into the brickwork. The stone plinth is adorned with patterned, cast-iron ventilator-grilles, including a larger grille at the right-hand end of the ground storey at number 2.

The interior of the houses has not been inspected.

These houses were built by Heathcoat and are similar to those at numbers 1-7 (odd) and 12-24 (even) Church Street. They were sketched in as a later addition on Heathcoat’s estate atlas of 1844 and appear to be the ‘6 cottages Church Street and Wellbrook’ built for Sir John Heathcoat-Amory in 1875-6, at the same time as Heathcoat Hall. The terrace represents part of a well-preserved group of artisan housing built for workers at the Heathcoat family's silk and lace mills, and is notable for its completeness within a planned group including an Anglican church, institute and school.