The Golden Lion Hotel

The Golden Lion Hotel is a large house, now operating as a hotel, dating from the early to mid-18th century. It was partially remodelled and extended in the late 18th or early 19th century, reputedly around 1790 for Nicholas Tripe, a surgeon. The front and back walls are painted brick, the right side wall and a left-hand addition are rendered. The roof is hipped and slate-covered, with rendered chimneys.

The building is double-fronted and double-depth, with a central entrance passage that leads to a staircase positioned between the right-hand front and back rooms. A ballroom is housed on the first floor of the left-hand extension. The building is three storeys high and five windows wide, with a single-window extension to the left.

The main entrance features a panelled front door within a moulded architrave, with four moulded panels above and flush panels below, including a central octagon. Fluted pilasters support an entablature with a modillioned cornice. The upper mouldings of the cornice have been replaced or concealed by a deep, flat canopy with a coffered underside (likely dating to the early 19th century). The sides of the canopy were encased in a later 20th-century addition, but the original golden lion figure, with its paw on a blue ball, remains at the top. A large iron hoop, supported by two painted stone columns, rises from the front of the canopy. Windows have flat, gauged arches and barred sashes with 8-over-8 panes on the ground and second storeys, and 4-over-4 panes on the third storey. Raised quoins, likely of cement, flank the front. A modillioned eaves-cornice runs along the top of the building. The left-hand addition has windows with barred sashes; the ground storey has 8-over-8 panes, and the third storey has 4-over-4 panes. A Venetian window with three round-arched lights is a distinctive feature on the second storey of the addition. The addition also has a prominent boxed eaves-cornice. The right side wall has two canted bays, with windows featuring 8 and 4-paned sashes. The rear wall also has similar sash windows, and the extension includes a three-light Venetian window that mirrors the one on the front.

Inside, the inner door has an early or mid-19th century moulded frame, accompanied by a patterned fanlight featuring a six-sided lantern with an enriched frame. Ground floor rooms and the entrance passage retain original bracketed and dentilled cornices. The first-floor landing also has a bracketed cornice. A dog-leg staircase is present, with a voluted balustrade at the foot, turned balusters with square necking-pieces, column-newels, and shaped step-ends. The ballroom has a moulded cornice and an enriched chandelier boss set within a small dome.