Tavern In The Town Public House

The Tavern in the Town Public House is likely from the mid to late 17th century, with alterations and additions made in the mid-19th century and subsequently. A further addition, possibly originally a separate house, adjoins the rear wing on Silver Street. The building is constructed of rendered red brick, with the earliest parts of the Diamond Street frontage utilising an English bond pattern (bricks measuring approximately 8.5-9 inches by 2-2.5 inches). Later brickwork, including on the right-hand side wall, is partly timber-bonded, and is of 19th-century date. The roof is tarred slate, with areas of pantile at the rear, and features decorated bargeboards on the left gable facing Diamond Street. The original red brick chimney on the right gable has been rebuilt, while a late 19th-century cream brick chimney is present on the left gable. A house incorporated on the Silver Street frontage has a rendered chimney on its right gable.

The Diamond Street frontage follows a two-room plan with gable fireplaces and a central through-passage, though the partition between the left-hand room and the passage has been removed. A straight-flight staircase, located adjoining the passage on the right, likely occupies the original stair position. An original, unheated, rear wing is to the right. The building has two storeys and a three-window range to Diamond Street. Upper-storey and right-hand ground-storey windows are long and low, occupying the space of former 17th-century mullioned windows, and are now replaced with 19th-century windows featuring two-pane sashes in the centre and four-pane casements at either side. The left-hand ground-storey window has a late 19th-century sash window with eight panes. The central front door dates to the mid-19th century and has six flush panels.

The Diamond Street range features a windowless gable. The rear wing on the right has one window per storey. The incorporated house on the left again has a two-window range. A recessed garage with glazed doors has been inserted to the left, and a casement window with three lights and two-pane transom lights is on the right. Upper-storey casement windows of 19th-century date, containing older glass, are present; two lights are to the left, and three to the right.

An inspection during the stripping out of the ground storey in 1986 revealed that the walls of the main range are largely original brick, with some alterations to the rear wall and the left-hand (north) end of the front wall, which has been wholly rebuilt in the 19th century. The building is a notable example of 17th-century brickwork in Devon.