Chapel Court

This is a block of apartments, originally the Star and Garter Inn, dating to 1715, located on Barton Street in Tewkesbury. A rainwater head bears the date 1715. The building is constructed with Flemish bond brickwork, with some timber framing, and has a tile roof.

The property has a wide central carriageway providing access to a courtyard, with wings on either side. The exterior is three storeys high, with an attic and basement, and is four windows wide. There are 20th-century lay-lights to the roof, and 16-pane sash windows with brick voussoirs and stone cills at the first and second floors. At ground floor level, there is a plate-glass square shop front with pilasters and a pedimented surround to the left, along with a similar pedimented door and doorcase incorporating a three-pane shop front to the right. Between these is a wide opening with cambered head, and modern wrought-iron gates set within a heavy door frame. Painted brick quoins alternate at each end, a brick string is present above the first floor, and there are brick dentil eaves. No chimney stack is visible. The wide sash windows appear to have replaced earlier, narrower 18th-century windows, which were subsequently blocked, although the original voussoirs remain visible. The first floor originally had five or seven bays, with alternate bays being blocked. Plain brick walls flank the carriageway, including a door to flats numbered 2-5 on the right. The back wall of the street block has a broad brick gable with large plate-glass sashes set in concrete lintels. A lead downpipe with a tripartite hopper-head displaying the date 1715 is situated to the right of the carriageway opening. To the east, there is a lower two-storey wing that encloses the courtyard, leading to a timber-framed end wall and return range. The west-facing wing has a door flanked by tripartite sashes at ground floor and a good 18th or early 19th-century wood balustrade built into the walling above. A small gabled cottage, currently commercial premises, is situated on the east side, beyond the wing.

The interior has been remodelled into apartments. The building was an important inn in the town but was already closed by 1774. Alterations to the street front, involving the blocking or replacement of 18th-century sashes with wider 16-pane sashes in the early 19th century, have resulted in an unusual window spacing, with the outer sashes being too close to the ends of the facade. The property originally extended to Swilgate Street at the rear, but later a Baptist Chapel was built on the site, which has now been converted into dwellings.