1 Fore Street including the range to Coombe Street and attached boundary walls and railings, and part of 3a Fore Street.

1 Fore Street including the range to Coombe Street and attached boundary walls and railings, and part of 3a Fore Street

A multi-phase domestic building complex comprising a 16th-century range with late-18th-century and later alterations, and an early 19th-century range with commercial premises on the ground floor.

Materials and Construction

The Coombe Street range is built of Chert rubble, partly rendered, while the building to Fore Street is rendered. Both have slate roofs with terracotta cresting and brick chimney stacks. Windows are timber or metal framed.

Plan and Overall Form

The Coombe Street range is rectangular in plan, slightly angled at the south end where it joins the north-west rear corner of the Fore Street building. The Fore Street building is square in plan and appears from aerial photographs to be a double-pile structure with a valley roof.

The Coombe Street Range

The Coombe Street range lies at right-angles to Fore Street and is two storeys with an attic, comprising four unequal bays running north to south. The roof is hipped at the south end where there is a relocated chimney stack, with another stack right of centre.

The principal elevation to the west shows the left-hand bay as late-18th-century in character and remodelled to a double-depth plan. It has a single 19th-century three-light timber window with a central opening casement at eaves level. The central bays probably comprise the core of the 16th-century building and feature a 19th-century seven-light window and a 12-pane window at eaves level, with a 20th-century 12-light fixed window on the ground floor. Immediately to the right is a three-light window with a Ham stone step-ogee-step-hollow moulded surround and hollow-moulded mullions. To the right are two 20th-century windows, one with a dropped cill. The right-hand bay, containing the stair, is stepped back and has a single timber sash window between the floor levels.

The return elevation to the south has a single entrance to the right, with a 20th-century canopy and timber door. Above is a small window with a miniature timber sash. The north elevation is exposed Chert rubble stone with a four-light casement to attic level and a three-light fixed 21st-century window at ground floor level.

The Fore Street Range

The principal elevation of the Fore Street range faces south onto the street. It is two storeys with an attic, and four bays east to west. On the ground floor is a modern shopfront flanked by timber pilasters with simple capitals; to its right is a recessed doorway to number 3a. On the first floor are four window openings, those to the left having slightly lower cills, all fitted with timber sash windows. There is a single 20th-century window to the attic storey on the west elevation. The east elevation abuts 3 Fore Street and has two windows to the attic storey. To the rear (north) there is a further brick chimney stack. Below this is a hipped-roof extension leading to a later, single-storey flat-roofed extension which fills the rear of the plot.

Interior of the Coombe Street Range

The Coombe Street range is entered at its south end into a small hallway giving access to the ground floor through an arched doorway. The ground floor is much altered with 21st-century partitions to create a residential unit. There are two substantial ceiling beams which mark the space into three bays. These are 46 centimetres wide with 20 centimetre-deep chamfers; both are plastered over. A large central pier marks the historic location of a fireplace. Adjacent to this is a possibly late-18th-century staircase with a simply-moulded handrail and newel and stick balusters. This leads to the first floor which comprises two further small units, divided by 21st-century partitions. These are linked by a corridor on the east side which leads to a staircase to the attic storey.

Within the attic at its south end are two arch-braced trusses with purlins and a flat collar; below the lower purlin are slots for wind-braces and there is some evidence of smoke blackening. At the north end are two tie-beam trusses with deep chamfers; one is partly enclosed, as is the central truss of the five.

Within the ground-floor entrance hallway (south) is a late-18th-century dogleg staircase which leads to the first floor and into the Fore Street range. It has a ramped handrail, brackets to the string, bobbin balusters and fielded dado panelling to the walls, including to its half- and first-floor landings. The landings have late-18th-century decorative plaster cornices with roundels on a frieze with a dentilled entablature. The ground floor under-stairs space has been infilled with a 20th-century cupboard.

Interior of the Fore Street Range

The Fore Street range is of lesser interest. The ground floor is entered from the street into a modern commercial unit, beyond which in a single-storey extension are commercial kitchens and a further residential unit. Within the frontage building is another residential unit on the first floor; the space to its east is a flying freehold to 3a Fore Street. Within the attic storey are a further two residential units.

Boundary Features

At the corner of Coombe Street and Fore Street is a low rubble-stone wall with long/short railings with spearheads and a working gate inserted in the inter-war years.