Wells Cathedral Junior School

WELLS

ST5446 NEW STREET 662-1/6/178 (East side) 12/11/53 No.10 Wells Cathedral Junior School

GV II

Wide frontage house in row. c1899, but on site of earlier buildings. Rendered with lining, ashlar dressings, Welsh slate roof between coped gables, rendered brick chimney stacks. PLAN: symmetrical double-depth plan with large front entrance hall and lateral rear staircase. EXTERIOR: 2 storeys with attics, 5 bays. Plinth, cornice, plain parapet, bays 1 and 2 recessed slightly. Sash windows of 12 panes with exposed boxes in plain openings, part-glazed 6-panel door to lower bay 3, with painted ashlar surround of Doric pilasters, entablature and pediment. Slightly set back left of bay 1 a second door, early C18 6-panelled (2 glazed) in plain opening. 4 flat-roofed dormer windows behind parapet. INTERIOR: all the detailing is consistent with a late C18 or early C19 date. The large elliptical panelled entrance hall opens left to a salon with guilloche frieze and egg-and-dart cornice, with central ceiling rosette, and to the right a similar room, with a cupboard in Gothick style; here as elsewhere in the house are doorcases and other trim with reeded surrounds to square blocking-pieces. The rear room to the left, the former kitchen, has a large brick fireplace with bread oven, and a large 20-pane sash window, also an early 3-plank ledged door. The straight-flight stair has decorative scrolled wrought-iron balustrade and a wreathed handrail. The first-floor rooms have similar detailing to those below, and that to the left has a white marble fireplace; a rear large sitting room has an imported fire surround, with glazed tiles. HISTORICAL NOTE: the site was developed early, since at least 1268, the house known to be ruinous and rebuilt in 1433/34. There is no overt evidence for earlier buildings. (Town and Country Planning Working Papers: Scrase AJ: Wells: A Study of Town Origins: Bristol: 1982-: 63).

Listing NGR: ST5496046076