Avonside

TEWKESBURY

SO8933 HIGH STREET 859-1/5/224 (West side) 04/03/52 No.63 Avonside

GV II*

Large house in row. Mid C18. Flemish bond brickwork, tile roof, brick stacks. A very substantial double-depth plan Georgian house. 3 storeys and basement, 5-windowed. 9-pane sashes at second floor, and 12-pane at first and ground floors, all to brick voussoirs and decorative keystones with cornice, stone cills, A wide central panelled door is set to fluted Doric quarter-columns, under a frieze and decorative fanlight. The plinth, containing air bricks for the basement, rises to the cills of the ground-floor windows. There is a plain band above the ground-floor keystones, and a moulded parapet coping. The plain return wall to the right has a large external brick stack near the back. The back, which may have been added a little later, is 4-windowed, with 4-pane sashes to the second floor, and 2 plate glass with two 12-pane sashes at ground and first floors, all to brick voussoirs without keystones. To the left, at first floor, is an early C19 two-bay balcony on 6 cast-iron brackets, and with decorative wrought-iron balustrade. Central panelled door under arch with plain fanlight, similar to that in No.62 (qv). INTERIOR: the entrance lobby, on Minton tile floor gives through a wide elliptical arch, with C20 glazed doors, to the stair hall with fielded panelling. To the right of the entry a room is completely lined with large fielded panels, in stripped pine, with a dado rail, and fireplace with reeded surround. The windows have inner shutters or panelling to unusually shallow reveals for a house of this period. There are fine moulded and eared architraves to panelled doors throughout. The grand open-well stair rises through both storeys to a plain glass or plastic dome-light, replacing the C18 light. The stair has an open string with scrolled ends to the treads, newels with drops, turned balusters, and a swept and wreathed mahogany handrail. A first-floor back room has 2 transverse beams and a reeded cornice and beam mouldings, with a C19 fireplace. This is one of the most grand of the rebuilt houses in the High Street, retaining most of its original external characteristics, and substantial unchanged interiors.

Listing NGR: SO8939033121