Description

TERRACE WALK
656-1/41/1673

Nos.7 AND 8

(Formerly Listed as:
TERRACE WALK
Nos 6-9 (consec) including 8A)
12/06/50

GV II

Shops with accommodation over. c1730, altered late C18 and late C19. By John Wood the Elder.
MATERIALS: Limestone ashlar with Welsh slate roof.
PLAN: Double depth plan, originally one house, now two.
EXTERIOR: Two storeys with full height attic, three-bay front to whole, one:two. Ground floor has two double fronted shopfronts of same design as No.6 (qv), that to No.7 has c1830 surround with early C20 infill, that to No.8 later reproduction. First and second floors of No.7 have late C18 tripartite sashes, six/six, flanked by four/four, also as No.6. First and second floors of No.8 have two sashes of late C18 type, but in the original openings, nine/six below, six/six above. Heavy cornice band at second floor level continuous along whole front of Nos 3-9. Parapet, roof not visible to front but from rear. Ashlar ridge stack without pots. Rear elevation also ashlar and has continuous second floor band. Three windows to No.7 and full height semicircular bay to No.8. Ground floor of No.7 has one C19 sash two/two, and wide late C18 opening with segmental fan head. Above three tall late C18 sashes, nine/six, attic has one, six/six. Bow of No.8 has three six/six to ground floor and three nine/six above and three six/six to attic. Conical roof to bow. Interesting to note that all windows are on south side of bow, demonstrating that immediately adjacent houses of Orange Grove (qv) were already in position.
INTERIORS: Not inspected, but No.7 reputed to have fine coved ceiling.
HISTORY: This building is evidently one of the four houses built by John Wood the Elder in The Terrace Walk soon after 1728, and a lease was granted by the Duke of Kingston for No.8 on 18th October 1733. It is shown on the Plan of the City of Bath, 1735, and also in Wood's plan in his `Essay towards the Description of Bath', 1749. It was evidently altered and partially refronted in the late C18, but possibly as late as 1816 when Terrace Walk was widened. No.8 Terrace Walk was the home of James Leake's bookshop and circulating library in the mid C18. This was described in 1738 edition of Defoe's Tour as 'one of the finest bookseller's shops in Europe'. Some have suggested that it was here that Leake's cousin, Samuel Richardson, wrote his epistolatory novel `Clarissa', published 1744, but this is highly speculative. Leake was also John Wood's publisher who assisted in his development undertakings. SOURCES: Walter Ison, 'The Georgian Buildings of Bath' (2nd ed. 1980), 140; Fawcett T and Inskip M, 'The Making of Orange Grove', Bath History (1994), 24-50.

Listing NGR: ST7519864758

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26674332

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Recommended Books

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  Hampshire: South (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
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