The former Mitre Inn

Summary

Former public house. Dating from the mid-C19 on this site. Converted to a Thai restaurant around 2007.

Reasons for Designation

The former Mitre Inn, a mid-C19 public house, now a restaurant, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:

* for its well-proportioned and architecturally refined façade onto West Street;
* for the late-C19 shopfront on Friar Street.

Historic interest:

* as a good example of a mid-C19 public house on a prominent corner location, adding value to the townscape of this part of Reading.

Group value:

* with the Grade I listed Greyfriars Church on the opposite side of Friar Street.

History

The first written record of Reading dates from the ninth century when the name seems to have referred to a tribe, called Reada’s people. It is possible that there was a river port here during the Roman occupation, and by 1086 there was a thriving urban community, as recorded in the Domesday Book. Reading Abbey was founded in 1121 and this transformed Reading into a place of pilgrimage as well as an important trading and ecclesiastical centre with one of the biggest and richest monasteries in England. By 1525 Reading was the largest town in Berkshire and the tenth-largest in England when measured in taxable wealth.

The Dissolution led to the monastic complex becoming a royal palace and by 1611 the town’s population had grown to over 5,000 as a result of its cloth trade. A number of the timber-framed houses from this period survive in Castle Street and Market Place.

During the C18 Reading became a prosperous market town and administrative centre, due to the development of the town’s waterways and road links. In 1723 the River Kennet was transformed into a canal, linking Reading to Newbury, further extended by the opening of the Kennet and Avon Canal in 1810, to create a route between Reading and the Bristol Channel. Turnpike roads were also improved, establishing major coaching routes from London to Oxford, the West Country and the southern coast. Iron works and brewing caused the expansion of the town further west along the Oxford and Bath Roads and in the older part of Reading, many older, timber-framed buildings were refaced in fashionable brick. A new town hall was built just northeast of the west end of Friary Street in 1786.

In the C19 the town expanded further; three separate railway companies ran routes through the town to London, causing a rapid increase in population (9,400 in 1801 to 21,500 in 1851 and over 70,000 by 1900) as well as the development of Reading’s famous Three B’s industries: beer (Simonds Brewery, 1785–2010), bulbs (Suttons Seeds, 1837–1974) and biscuits (Huntley and Palmers, 1822–1976). Growth during this period was characterised by the proliferation of brick terraces, and Hardy referred to Reading as ‘Albrickham’ in his novel Jude the Obscure. In 1869 the town was confirmed as the county town for Berkshire.

Today, Reading is one of the largest urban areas in the UK without city status. The town centre was considerably changed in 1969 when the Inner Distribution Road opened, shortly followed by the M4 in 1971.

Previously located in Friar Street, close to the Church of St Laurence, The Mitre moved to its present position in West Street in the mid-C19. George Partridge was the landlord from about 1841-1854 and the first documentary evidence of the present building is its inclusion on the Ordnance Survey map published in 1841. In the 1842 Post Office directory, it is described as a beer shop and chop house and in 1869 it is recorded as having an alehouse licence. From 1870-1895 the pub had its own brewery, located in the yard to the south-west of the pub, with William Newell as the resident brewer. By 1903 it had passed to the Wallingford Brewery which was in turn acquired by Ushers of Trowbridge in 1928. In 1903 the premises were owned by Mrs Emily Hicks of Peckham Rye, with a lease to the brewers. The licensee then was Tom Waldron and the bar area was divided into three compartments with a smoking room (see SOURCES, Dearing, Cliffe & Williams). The house was reported as ‘used by tradesmen, artisans and the working classes, also theatre goers and actors’. The pub stood near to the former Palace Theatre and Gracie Fields and Max Miller were reputedly patrons. By the early 1970s, it had become part of the Watney’s Schooner Inn chain of pub restaurants. By 2001 it had become the Bistrot Vino restaurant before becoming a Thai restaurant around 2007.

Details

Former public house. Dating from the mid-C19 on this site. Converted to a Thai restaurant around 2007.

MATERIALS: white colour-washed brick laid in Flemish bond with clay tile roof and clay hanging tiles to rear top floor.

PLAN: three-storey plus cellar, rectangular principal range fronting onto West Street with tile roof (hipped at the north end) behind a parapet. The range has two chimney stacks with tall chimney pots at the south end and north-west corner. The existence of a cellar with a stone flagged floor is suggested by evidence of a barrel shute on the front elevation and documentary evidence but it was not inspected. To the rear is a lower, parallel, two-storey plus attic range (reduced to two storeys at the south end) with an entrance at the north end onto Friar Street. A single-storey, clay-tile roofed extension extends from the rear of the building adjoining the rear of 90 - 91 Friar Street with a flat-roofed modern extension* at the western end. On the south side of the yard is another parallel brick range, possibly originally a stable block. Internally, the ground floor* of the principal range consists of a dining room with a service area at the south end. The first floor* contains a secondary dining area and the second floor has a number of bedrooms.

EXTERIOR: the symmetrical eastern frontage onto West Street is of five bays with a centrally-placed entrance with modern glazed doors. The entrance has a wide, corbelled, hood with a central open-pedimented feature beneath which the strap-work decoration is partially obscured by a modern facia panel. Fenestration on the ground floor is of eight-over-one timber sash windows set in segmental openings with volute keystones. On the first floor, the sashes are six-over-six in plain segmental openings and on the second floor, the three central windows have three-over-three sashes in square-headed openings below a narrow stringcourse. The two outer openings are blocked. Above the astragal cornice, the parapet has stone copings.

The single bay of the Friar Street (north) elevation of the principal range has an off-set entrance with a similar, but narrower, hood to that over the West Street entrance. The single, centrally placed, fenestration to the upper floors follows that on the West Street elevation. The single-bay elevation of the rear range has a late-C19 shop front with a recessed entrance flanked by a pair of single-pane windows, framed by pilasters and a cornice supported on volutes. The first floor has an off-centre two-over-two timber sash window in a square-headed opening. The sloping tiled roof has a gabled dormer with hanging tiles and a pair of four-pane casement windows with two-pane transoms.

INTERIOR: the interior of the ground floor* and first floor* of the principal range has been completely refurbished as a Thai restaurant with no historic features evident. The top floor of the principal range and interior of the two-storey range fronting onto Friar Street were not inspected.

* Pursuant to s1 (5A) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 (‘the Act’), it is declared that these aforementioned features, including the interior of the ground and first floors of the principal range and the modern extension at the west end of the western extension, are not of special architectural or historic interest, however any works which have the potential to affect the character of the listed building as a building of special architectural or historic interest may still require LBC and this is a matter for the LPA to determine.

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:

39241

Legacy System:

LBS

Sources

Books and journals
Dearing, John, Cliffe, David, Williams, Evelyn, Abbot Cook to Zero Degrees, an A-Z of Reading's Pubs and Breweries, (2021), 142-143

Websites
Pub History in the UK: Mitre, 47 West Street, Reading, Berkshire, accessed 02 March 2022 from https://pubwiki.co.uk/Berkshire/Reading/Mitre.shtml

End of official list entry

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