4, Buttgarden Street

BIDEFORD

SS4526 BUTTGARDEN STREET 842-1/6/54 (East side) 19/03/73 No.4

GV II

House. Believed to have been built between 1814 and 1820. Rendered solid front. Slate roof, hipped to left. Rendered chimney on each gable-wall. Double-depth plan, 2 rooms wide, with central entrance-passage leading to stair at rear. Small later annexe to left. 2 storeys; main building with basement and garret. 2-window range with round-arched doorway between the ground-storey windows. Annexe 1-window wide. Main building has in ground storey horizontal channelling with voussoirs and keystones marked in. Deeply-recessed door reached by 4 old stone steps, the channelling continued into the sides of the recess; 6-panelled door with knocker; fanlight with radial bars; inset round-headed shoescraper inside right jamb. Whole front has flanking pilasters which stop well short of eaves. Continued sills in second storey. Barred sashes throughout: in ground storey 8 over 8 panes to left, 8 over 12 to right, and in second storey 12 over 12 in each window. Annexe has canted bay window in upper storey. Rear elevation (clearly visible from Bideford Bridge) has canted bay window and small-paned, round-arched stair window. INTERIOR: entrance-passage has enriched cornice; round-arched rear opening with pilasters. Wooden geometrical stair with voluted foot to balustrade; rises to garret; slender turned balusters with square necking-pieces, some of the balusters of iron; moulded nosings to treads. Most of rooms have 6-panelled doors, panelled shutters and moulded plasterwork. Ground-floor left front, first-floor left front and rear rooms the best with enriched cornices, friezes and ceiling-bands; also foliated chandelier-bosses. Ground-floor left front room has chimneypiece of grey veined marble with attached columns; cast-iron grate with coloured tiles. First-floor left rear room has simpler white marble chimneypiece with cast-iron basket-grate. Left rear ground-floor room, probably the original kitchen, has slate-flagged floor. One roof-truss exposed; this has a high collar supporting a kingpost, together with vertical struts rising from tie-beam to principal rafters. The original owner is reported to have been a surgeon. (Title deeds: information from owner derived from: 1990-).

Listing NGR: SS4533026351