Castle Restaurant

Castle Restaurant, 6-12 Castle Street

A near symmetrical "artisan-classical" terrace of 10 bays, originally comprising 4 houses of 3 storeys with attics. The design is dominated by a pediment over the 4 central bays and strong rhythm imposed by a continuous cornice over the ground floor, carried on fluted Ionic columns. These columns articulate the original property divisions, frame doorways, and at first floor alternate with paired round-arched windows linked by balconies.

The front elevation is faced in stucco, drafted in the lower storey and scribed above, with rusticated angle pilasters. The roof is slate, set on bracketed eaves with brick stacks.

The ground floor features a central tripartite sash window. The disposition of detail elsewhere is asymmetrical, reflecting the unequal division into separate properties. Nos 6 and 8 at the right (north) end are 2-bay houses with doorways in the right-hand bay, though the upper storeys of No 6 have only a single window. No 10 was originally a 2-bay house, probably with a lower-storey shop, positioned under the central pediment. No 12 was a 4-bay house. Nos 10 and 12 are now amalgamated into a single property.

Doorways have doors incorporating round-headed panels and plain overlights, except No 12 which has a small-pane overlight. The lower-storey windows are 12-pane horned sashes. Windows to Nos 10 and 12 are framed by moulded consoles with Celtic interlace ornament below the ground-floor cornice. At first floor, 2-light casement windows with transoms are set in round arches in the paired outer and central bays, with cast-iron balconies of lattice-work over a Greek key frieze. The upper storey has 9-pane sash windows, horned to Nos 10 and 12 and hornless to Nos 6 and 8, with a sill band. A shallow open pediment spanning the central 4 bays contains a round-headed sash window in a rusticated architrave.

The rubble-stone rear elevation has an 8-pane sash window lighting the stair on the right side at middle-storey level.