Friends Meeting House

The Friends Meeting House in Bridgwater was built in 1722, with significant alterations in 1801 and an extension around 1971-1972. It features a limestone rubble plinth and is constructed of Flemish-bond brick topped with a pantile roof and a brick stack on the left gable end. The building has an L-shaped plan and stands two storeys high with a three-window range.

On the first floor, there is a 6/6-pane sash window at eaves level on the left and two 8/8-pane sashes on the right. The ground floor has gauged brick segmental arches above two 6/6-pane sashes on the left, two blind windows on the right, and double doors to the left of centre. These doors have two panels with beaded edges and are accessed by three steps, with a late 19th-century boot scraper set into the plinth. The rear wall of the main block is made of limestone rubble, and the windows in the rear wing have timber lintels.

Inside, the entrance hall features stone flagging and a barrel-vaulted ceiling, with six-panel doors on either side. The door to the right leads to the former meeting room, which has steps leading to a platform along the front wall. The current long meeting room, likely from 1801, is separated by a wooden screen of vertical sliding sashes and has a six-panel door to the left. The lower part of the room is panelled with horizontal tongued-and-grooved planks, and it features large windows with four rows of six panes on the left wall, along with two octagonal stone columns at the front (south) end.