Lamb and Fountain Inn

Lamb and Fountain Inn

Public house situated on Castle Street. Built in the late 17th or early 18th century, with 18th-century additions and later alterations.

The building is constructed of coursed local limestone rubble with freestone dressings, with interlocking clay tiled roofs and stone and brick chimneystacks.

The structure follows an accretional L-shaped plan. The main block is two and a half storeys high with a gabled front facing Castle Street, beneath which are cellars. An 18th-century range extends to the north-east, double depth in plan with a basement, and a cross wing aligned north-west to south-east is attached. These additions were originally used for stabling and storage but were later converted to a maltings and are now vacant. The ground slopes steeply downward to the rear, where the cellars are accessed at ground level.

The principal façade features three-light windows to each gable end with hood moulds to both ground floor openings and to the first floor window in the left-hand gable. The left-hand attic window has been blocked, while the right-hand window has a chamfered 19th-century casement. The main entrance is set in the left-hand gable with a studded door of around 1700 set in a later surround. The north-east 18th-century range is one and a half storeys with a basement, displaying an irregular pattern of fenestration and door openings. A mullioned opening with a block surround, now blocked, originally lit the cellar area at lower level. The cross wing features a two-light timber casement and doorway to the ground floor, both with timber lintels, and an enlarged opening in the gable.

The west elevation is largely blank except for a window at the north end of the ground floor. The rear is partly obscured by later extensions: a raised addition to the back parlour supported on cast iron columns, timber posts and metal poles, and a 20th-century toilet block on a blockwork base. Most rear windows have been altered, though a three-light ovolo mullion window survives beneath the eaves, along with an attic dormer. Some window openings in the 18th-century range and cross wing have been replaced or altered.

Interior: The Castle Street entrance leads to a through passage with public rooms to the left and private accommodation to the right. The off-sales hatch retains some 18th-century joinery. Stairs to the upper floors, toilet block and cellars lie to the rear. Two public rooms are divided by a central bar facility. The front bar contains a fireplace with a 20th-century surround; the back parlour, extended to the rear in the 19th century, retains a late-19th-century carved stone fireplace and a serving hatch. Evidence of 18th-century panelling survives, though re-sited. The former lounge, now a pool room, is located off the back parlour in the rear part of the 18th-century range. The upper floors of the main range were not inspected. Beneath the inn is a complex series of cellars and sub-cellars. Within the sub-cellars is an ice house built into the void, a cup and dome structure that may date from the time of the building's construction. A further cellar or tunnel lined with limestone rubble has been located beneath the left-hand half of the inn building.

The 18th-century north-east range is double depth in plan. The northern half, fronting onto Castle Street, was originally used for stabling and storage but was converted to a maltings in the 18th century. It retains a malt kiln, an ashlar-built tank or trough probably for steeping grain, and a large barrel-vaulted cellar. The roof structure appears to have been replaced in the late 19th century, though some earlier steeply pitched timbers survive, including the purlins and timbers that previously supported a louvred cowl for a vent above the kiln. The rear half of the 18th-century range was not inspected internally, but photographs indicate it retains a late-17th or early-18th-century winder staircase with moulded risers, probably once providing additional domestic accommodation. The interior of the gabled cross wing retains little evidence of historic fittings; the first floor timbers and roof structure appear to be late-19th-century replacements.

A boundary wall of limestone rubble with coping stones stands at the rear of the property.

History: During the latter half of the 17th century, the prosperity of the wool trade drove rapid population growth in Frome. By the early 1700s, the town had become an important commercial centre said to be larger than Bath. This prosperity created demand for workers and housing, resulting in intense urban growth, including the area around Castle Street. The Lamb and Fountain is documented as a public house from at least 1785 and formed part of the estate of John Moore in 1829. At that time, the north-eastern part of Castle Street where the public house is located was known as Fountain Lane, named after the inn.