George IV Hotel

The George IV Hotel is a large and ambitious building designed in a Jacobethan domestic style. The main elevation and west gable return are constructed from dressed flint with ashlar dressings, including bands that frame the windows. The east gable return features roughly coursed and squared rubble, while the rear service wings are roughcast rendered. The building has slate roofs with red tiled crestings and brick stacks on the end walls and axial positions. It stands three storeys tall with an attic and has a seven-window range.

The facade is characterized by a series of full-height bays that contain the windows of the main rooms and the storeyed entrance porch. The outer bays and the storeyed porch to the right of the center are rectangular, while there is a canted bay to the left of center. Each bay features paired 2-light mullioned windows on every floor, with transoms on the ground and first floors and decorative leading in the upper lights. Each attic gable has a small 2-light window, and the upper storey of the canted bay is heavily corbelled out to form the gable. Between the bay windows are 3-light mullioned and transomed windows with similar detailing, and there are single light windows on each floor to the right of the porch. The porch has a segmentally arched entrance and a 4-light mullioned and transomed window above, topped with a pedimented hood mould. The upper storey windows echo the design of the bay windows. Ball finials adorn the copings of the porch gable, and continuous hood mould bands run along the ground and first floor windows, with the hood moulds of the upper storey windows continuing as a moulded eaves cornice over the intermediate bays.

The original layout of the hotel remains largely intact, although much of the interior detail has been altered. A notable feature is the fine open well cantilevered staircase, which has arcaded galleries at the landings. The dining room, added around 1920, includes smooth oak wall panelling with a bracketed plate rail or cornice.