Ye Olde Bull's Head Inn including attached rear range

Ye Olde Bull's Head Inn

A 3-storey hotel built of scribed render painted cream, with a slate roof behind a coped parapet set on a moulded wooden cornice. The end stacks are rendered, and a coursed stone stack stands to the right of centre.

The entrance front is 7 bays arranged as 4+3, with the left-hand section being the earlier part of the building. The right-hand side has windows positioned at a higher level in the middle and upper storeys. Between these two sections is a rainwater head bearing the inscription 'TIB 1766' in raised letters and numerals, positioned at the level of the eaves from when the building was enlarged in that year. The entrance occupies the 4th bay near the centre and is framed by an open Tuscan porch with wooden columns and pediment. Double fielded-panel doors are topped by a 2-pane overlight, with a small-pane inserted window to the right of the doorway. The lower storey contains 12-pane sash windows, hornless to the left of the entrance and horned to the right. The middle storey has 12-pane horned sashes on the left side (hornless to the left-hand window) and 4-pane hornless sashes to the right. Between the middle and upper storeys runs a modern sign reading 'Ye Olde Bull's Head Inn'. The upper storey has 2-light casements.

A 2-storey lean-to occupies the left gable end, with coped verge. Its lower storey features a 19th-century shop front with simple pilasters and consoles framing a drip mould. A half-glazed fielded-panel door stands on the left, with a 4-pane horned sash window to the right. Above is a 12-pane horned sash window with lying panes. Set back at the right end, on the corner with Rating Row, is a single-storey hipped lean-to. It has a 12-pane horned sash window to Castle Street, a 15-pane fixed window in the splayed angle (probably formerly a doorway), and a shop window to Rating Row comprising 5x4 panes, framed by panelled pilasters and a moulded fascia and cornice. A cast-iron street sign is mounted on its left side.

The rear of the main hotel range comprises 3 rubble-stone gabled bays, the left-hand one extended in pebble-dash. The central gable contains a round-headed radial glazed mid-20th-century metal-framed stair window offset to the left, a 2-light casement above it and a 1-storey projection below. The right-hand gable has a stack at its left angle and is attached to a 1½-storey rear range of rubble stone. This range has an added modern lean-to in the courtyard. Above are three 2-light half-dormers and a raked half-dormer to the right. Further right are additional extensions.

The internal plan has undergone alteration. Behind the entrance lobby is an 18th-century dog-leg stair with square newel, turned wooden balusters and moulded handrail, mostly renewed. On the left side of the building is another rear stair of 17th-century origin but substantially rebuilt. A dog-leg stair from ground to first floor has replacement plain balusters and square newels at the base, above which are turned balusters and a square newel. The landing has a similar balustrade forming a well around the lower stair and continuing to the upper storey, whose upper portion has replacement plain balusters. Beneath this stair are stone steps descending to a cellar fitted with timber beams.

In the upper storey, the 4-bay left-hand side of the building contains 3 trusses with collar beams, probably dating to 1766 as they correspond with the height of the dated rainwater head. On the 3-bay right side are 2 trusses at a similar level, but of early 19th-century character with chamfered principals and raking struts.