4, High Street

WELLS

ST5445 HIGH STREET 662-1/7/80 (North side) 24/01/94 No.4

GV II

House in row, with shop. Late C15 or C16 structure to rear, some C17 fabric in front range, mid C20 facade. Rubble with some timber-frame, but rendered and colourwashed brickwork facade, slate roofs. PLAN: a narrow-frontage unit with winder stair rear right, and a small yard to rear, right, covered; to the rear, offset left, and interlocking with No.6 (qv) adjoining, a shallow range parallel with High Street and with gable to the E. All considerably modified by removal of walls and structure. EXTERIOR: 3 storeys and basement, 1 bay width; ground floor C20 shop-front with near-central recessed doorway and deep fascia. At first floor is a wide 9-light steel casement, and above is a similar 6-light casement. False pilasters return as a dentilled parapet, all formed in the rendering; the gable to the rear range is rendered, and contains an early C19 16-pane sash. The main range also has an early 2-light casement in the rear wall. INTERIOR: the ground-floor front has no early structure visible; the rear room is smaller, with one chamfered and stopped beam, built into the wall, left, but suspended on a stirrup, right, where earlier walling has been removed. There is an C18 fielded panel door to the basement (not accessible). A late C19 dog-leg staircase to the right has remains of a diagonal stick balustrade with turned newel, and at the upper landing, where structural walling has been removed, is a slender cast-iron column carrying a beam. First-floor front has, approximately 800mm from the front wall, a full-width chamfered beam with lamb's-tongue stops. The rear room has substantial remains of heavy framing, but to the right the original structure was removed, and a thick wall inserted, itself now partly removed. In the party wall are 2 substantial structural posts, one in the rear corner with wide rough chamfer to a run-out stop carrying a broad beam partly built in to the party wall at the rear; this wall has a C20 fireplace. The centre beam has large square stops to the left, and run-out to the right, partly built in to the wall. The upper flight of stairs has been removed. Second floor front has no visible early features, and a steep hipped roof of the C20. The rear room, entered through a wide-plank ledged door, has a 2-bay roof with 2 trusses-the third, to the right, removed with the rebuilding of this gable wall. The roof has cambered collars, 2 purlins with run-out stops, and broad chamfered wind-braces in the middle range; the outer brace to the E is missing. This property has considerable historic fabric of interest, which appears to interlock with, and may have been built as part of No.6; the shallow front range is oddly related on plan. (Hale B: Vernacular Architecture Group Report: 1988-).

Listing NGR: ST5495845756