4, Fore Street

This is a house, originally comprising shop premises, dating to the 16th or early 17th century, with substantial rebuilding in the early 19th century and a rear wing likely dating to the late 17th or early 18th century. The rear wing has a roughly plastered timber frame, partially refaced with plastered brick. It is covered with asbestos slate, while the front range features a roof with gabled ends adjacent to neighboring buildings. The rear wing has a gable facing Back Lane.

The front range is likely the lower portion of a three-room house, reduced to a single room and largely rebuilt in the early 19th century; a shop was inserted into the ground floor in the late 19th century. The rear wing was originally a one-room cottage of two storeys and an attic, with a gabled front facing Back Lane and a fireplace on the rear wall of each room, along with a newel staircase in the rear right-hand corner. An additional single-room space of uncertain date, possibly 18th century, sits in the angle between the front range and rear cottage.

The front elevation is three storeys high with a single-window range. The ground floor features a late 19th-century double-fronted shop with a fascia, cornice, plate glass windows, and a 20th-century central door. Early 19th-century sash windows with glazing bars are present on the first and second floors, with 16 and 12 panes respectively, each using crown glass. The rear elevation, facing Back Lane, is two storeys and an attic high, with a gabled front. It has a small 20th-century plate glass window and a door with a wooden fascia board, likely formerly a shop, and a 20th-century two-light casement window on the first floor. An attic window, also a 19th-century two-light casement with glazing, sits within a cambered arch. A two-storey, one-bay addition is present to the left.

Inside the front range, a crossbeam remains with stop-chamfered spine beams with run-out stops, and an original roof truss at the right-hand end displaying morticed apex and threaded details for a ridge piece and purlins. The rear wing retains its probably original roof with two trusses, featuring principals pegged to halved curved wall posts and trenched purlins. A wooden newel staircase is found in the rear corner, with 18th-century two-panel doors at the top and bottom of each flight. Blocked fireplaces are present on the back wall of each storey. The ceilings are plastered, and the interior of the rear wing remains largely unaltered. The rear wing is a rare example of a small, three-story town house with a complete internal plan.