Description

CHESTER CITY (IM)

SJ4066SE EASTGATE STREET AND ROW
595-1/4/180 (South side)
28/07/55 No.26 Street and No.32 Row
(Formerly Listed as:
EASTGATE STREET
No.26 Street & No.32 Row)

GV II*

Undercroft and town house, now undercroft shop, Row shop and
ancillary storage and office. C17, early C18 and 1858 by TM
Penson for Butt in proto Vernacular Revival style. Sandstone
and timber frame with plaster panels; old brown brick to west
side; grey slate roof, ridge at right angle to front.
EXTERIOR: 3 storeys of one bay. Modern shopfront to street of
no interest between sandstone stop-chamfered end-piers to
undercroft, half-round responds and foliar capitals to Row
storey. Cast-iron Gothic Row-front railings; covered sloping
stallboard 2.2m from front to back; terrazzo Row walk;
shopfront with no features of special interest; panelled
ceiling to stallboard and Row; Row-top bressumer with moulded
chamfers. The third storey has a row of 10 small-framed
panels, a leaded 5-light mullioned and transomed casements
with 2 close-stud round-topped panels to each side. Quadrant
brackets on 4 angel corbels, with 10 small panels between,
support the fourth storey jetty-beam which has moulded arris;
a central canted 3-light oriel on a massive moulded corbel in
an arch-braced truss, with an S-shaped strut to each side of
oriel and chamfered corner posts; richly carved and crocketed
bargeboards; carved finial with pendant. The brick west wall
has a replaced 3-light mullioned window and a tall lateral
chimney.
INTERIOR: the undercroft, 3 steps down, has surfaces covered.
The early C20 Row shop retains the form of a previous
galleried hall. The open-string open-well early C18 stair to
the rear has plinthed newels, 3 vase balusters per step,
shaped brackets and a heavy swept rail, all painted. The good
parlour above the Row has oak wainscot to all walls with 2
rows of panels beneath the dado rail and above it 3 rows of
vertical proportion with a row of broad panels beneath the oak
cornice; the carved oak fireplace has architraves flanked by
foliar motifs and a frieze with a fine pictorial panel of old
Chester and the Dee in relief, between swags; oak door of 2
short, 2 long and 2 short fielded panels; boxed beams;
original joists.
The timber-framed front to this item is one of the earliest of

the forerunners of the Vernacular Revival in Chester; the C17
over-Row parlour is the best, other than in Watergate Street,
Chester.
(Improvement Committee Minutes: Chester City Council:
23/6/1858: 1858-; Chester Rows Research Project: Harris R:
Eastgate Street South: 1989-1990).

Listing NGR: SJ4060766280

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q17552194

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Northamptonshire: Buildings of England Series (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Period Property Manual (New Ed)
• 
  Old House Handbook 2 Books Bundle Collection (Old House Handbook: A Practical Guide to Care and Repair,Old House Eco Handbook: A Practical Guide to Retrofitting for Energy-Efficiency & Sustainability)
• 
  Derbyshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Cornwall (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  London 4: North: North v. 4 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)