Silvester House

BIDEFORD

SS4526 BUTTGARDEN STREET 842-1/6/63 (West side) No.15 Silvester House

GV II

House with shop. Early C20. Solid rendered front. Slated roof with pierced, crested red ridge-tiles. 2 and-a-half storeys, the half-storey partly in the roof-space; one-window range. Ground storey has original shop front with flanking pilasters, these carrying tall bracketed blocks with the number of the house inset at the top. Between the blocks runs a glazed fascia, inscribed in gilt letters T. L. HAMLYN & SON: above is a moulded cornice with floral iron cresting. Plain display window, canted inwards at left-hand end to accommodate the shop door, above which is written in gilt letters SIGN WRITERS. GILDERS. House-door to left is half-glazed with a solid moulded panel at the bottom. Fanlight has the name SILVESTER HOUSE in gilt letters, enclosed by a gilt border with red, green, and black flowers. Left reveal in front of door carries a large painting in Art Nouveau style of a woman in a long, off-the-shoulder dress wandering in the countryside; beneath it is a quotation from Tennyson, 'Then flush'd her cheek with rosy light, She glanced across the plain'. The painting is signed BERT HAMLYN and dated 1912. The floor below it is covered with coloured, patterned mosaic and bears the name HAMLYN. Second storey flanked by panelled pilaster-strips with scrolls at the top, these supporting a cornice which extends across the whole front. In the centre a canted bay window with shaped base; wooden casements, the transom-lights with coloured glass. The sills and transoms are continued to meet the pilasters. Third or half-storey has raised quoins. At the top a prominent eaves-cornice on large, multiple, shaped brackets, this being broken in the centre by a tall dormer-gable with projecting eaves and bargeboards. Dormer has 2-light casement window with transom-light containing coloured glass; mock timber-framing on face of gable above. INTERIOR: shop has original decorated panelling. Iron chimneypieces with inner surround of coloured tiles. Ceiling at the front, apparently with coloured paper decoration; patterned ceiling of plaster or papier-mache at rear. Upper storeys not inspected.

Listing NGR: SS4529826394