Summary
Late C18 public house retaining a stone-built rear wing that may represent the remains of an earlier building which had its gable-end facing the street.
Reasons for Designation
The Golden Lion, a late C18 public house with its potentially earlier rear wing, is listed Grade II for the following principal reasons:
* Architecture, date: for its late C18 frontage building and the interest that this appears to have replaced the southern bay of an earlier stone building that survives as a rear range;
* Structure: for the use of tie bars instead of internal masonry walls to tie the front range’s front and rear walls together, together with the survival of planked partitions on its upper floors.
History
The Golden Lion is thought to date to the late C18, partly on the basis of the form of the window lintels to the front elevation. It is identified as the Golden Lion, one of the inns and taverns on Market Place included in Baines Directory of 1823. However the 1853 Ordnance Survey town plan does not label the building as a public house and appears to depict it as being divided into three properties, the front range divided into two with the stone-built rear range also being separate. Given that there is a continuous record of landlords for the Golden Lion through the C19 (and the town plan does not show the Golden Lion elsewhere), this suggests that it was a simple ale house, possibly only occupying part of the building, rather than an inn at this time. The 1890 town plan shows the front range as being unified, along with half of the rear range, all being marked as a public house.
Analysis of the building suggests that the stone-built rear range may actually be the earliest part of the building, the three storey frontage representing a rebuilding of the southernmost bay of a house that originally presented its gable to the street. This might also explain the use of a mix of squared and rubble stone used for the rear of the main building. The substantial late medieval timber exposed in the cellar, reused as a principal joist, would have come from an even earlier building, probably from elsewhere. The brick-built extension* to the stone rear range appears to have been added by 1853 and is thought to be early C19, this brick extension not being of special interest. Also not of special interest is the single storey infill* between this rear range and the Shambles that was added in the C20 to extend the bar area and to provide toilets.
Details
Public house, late C18, the stone-built rear range possibly being earlier.
MATERIALS: red brick in Flemish bond to the front elevation, ground floor being rendered; local rubble and squared stone to the rear; the side elevation being rendered, inscribed to imitate stone ashlar. Brick outshot in English Garden Wall bond. Rear range of coursed, squared stone with a brick extension* in English Garden Wall bond. Pan tile roofs, brick stacks.
PLAN: central entrance plan with the stair to the rear right (N). Small outshot to the rear left (W) and a two storey range extended from the rear right. Ground floor partially opened up, but retaining part of the entrance passage.
EXTERIOR: Front (SE): symmetrical of three bays and three storeys with a moulded timber eaves cornice, raised coped gables with kneelers and end stacks. Upper windows have stone wedge lintels with projecting key-blocks, projecting stone sills and two-over-two, horned sashes. The two ground floor windows have been replaced with circa 1930 canted bay windows with leaded lights. The front door has a rectangular over-light which is also leaded. There are pattresses for tie bars at both first and second floor levels, the lower two being circular, upper two being X-form. The central window to the top floor is blocked and has a silhouette of a heraldic, rampant golden lion.
SW gable: blind except for two small Yorkshire sash windows, one lighting the attic to the outshot, the second being to the rear of the main attic.
Rear: Yorkshire sash window with a timber lintel to the first floor of the outshot.
Rear range: the stone built section (of two bays) has a central ridge stack and three Yorkshire sash windows, one to the first floor, two to the ground floor, now internal to the C20 single storey infill. The single bay NW brick extension* has an end stack*, and a number of modified openings* (either blocked or inserted or otherwise altered) all existing openings having C20 joinery.
INTERIOR: the front range, with the outshot, has been largely opened up on the ground floor, but retains a short entrance passage terminating at a C19 doorway with a three pane over-light, the door being a later replacement. Bar fittings*, built-in seating*, fireplaces* and panelling* are C20 of utilitarian design. Internal walls on the upper floors of the front range are mainly light-weight, planked partitions which are thought to be original. Fireplaces have been removed apart from one that retains a late C19 cast iron fire surround. The staircases are mainly enclosed by planked partitions, but there is one short section of original balustrading on the first floor. Doors are mainly C20 replacements* except for two planked doors on HL hinges on the second floor and an C18 two panel-door to the cellar. Exposed in the ceiling of the cellar is a reused beam from a late medieval timber-framed building, mortise holes indicating that it was formerly a rail jointed to five studs and a brace. The interior of the stone-built rear range retains its central stack (which indicates that the upper floor was unheated), but has otherwise been reconfigured. Both the front and rear ranges have simple purlin roof structures.
SPECIAL NOTE: the round arched doorway between the rear yard and The Shambles, with its board and baton door with fittings, is included in the listing for 2-16 (even) The Shambles.
* Pursuant to s.1 (5A) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 (‘the Act’) it is declared that these aforementioned features (marked *) are not of special architectural or historic interest.
