The Abergavenny Bookshop

The Abergavenny Bookshop comprises Nos. 1 High Street and 23 Market Street, a Grade II listed building of three storeys with stucco frontage, presumed to be over timber framing. The mullioned windows appear to be ashlar stone, with natural slate roofs and red brick stacks. The building has a single depth plan with a continuous jetty fronting Market Street.

The structure consists of one gabled bay facing High Street and two gabled bays facing Market Street, the right-hand one being No. 23. The ground floor of No. 1 features a late 19th-century shopfront with a centre door facing the High Street and two further display windows positioned under the jetty. The shopfront retains a similar appearance to a late 19th-century photograph, though with some alterations. The Abergavenny Bookshop has extended its premises to include No. 11.

The jetty is supported on seven iron posts, presumably installed in the mid-19th century. These appear to be the same posts shown in the late 19th-century photograph. The first floor contains a 3-light mullion-and-transom window with 4-centred heads to the lights and a dripmould above, facing the High Street, and a 2-light window in each Market Street gable. These windows are positioned off-centre. Beneath the junction of the gables, each house has a small 20th-century window; the openings themselves are shown in an early photograph, with an additional opening to the right on No. 23.

The gables feature a 2-light mullion-and-transom window facing the High Street, and plain 2-light and 3-light windows facing Market Street. The 2-light window on the Market Street side is post-World War II. The gables have fretted bargeboards and steeply pitched roofs. A tall 3-flued chimney stack stands on the rear wall of No. 1; the chimney formerly on the gable of No. 23 has been removed.

The interior was not inspected at resurvey. Neither of the shop interiors, which are run together, displays any historic features. The rear elevation was not inspected.