Summary
Former merchant's house, now a public house. C16, with C18 and early-C19 alterations.
Reasons for Designation
The Lower George Hotel, Westgate Street, Gloucester is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
Architectural interest:
* as an example of a C16 merchant’s house, fabric from which (including timber framing and a cellar) may survive;
* its C18 stucco refronting is well-proportioned and creates a handsome presence on the street.
Historic interest:
* as a reflection of the prosperity of the city from the early C17;
* as an important city inn from the mid-C18;
Group value:
* with other listed merchant’s houses on Westgate Street.
History
In the late C14 Gloucester’s trade industry – principally in corn and wine – enriched a small but influential group of merchants who monopolised official positions of the city. By the early C17 merchants were displaying their prosperity in new or enlarged houses located within the central parishes. Their proximity to the focus of communal life and centre of the borough administration was an added benefit. A few notable examples of these merchant’s houses survive along Westgate Street as testaments to the area’s trading activity and the prominence of these wealthy officeholders throughout the late medieval and early modern periods.
In the late C18, the Lower George was one of the chief inns in the city, owned in the C19 by Stroud Brewery. The refronting of the building in the mid or late C18 was probably to raise its status as an inn or hotel, and it may have been a coaching in before that date.
Details
Former merchant's house, now a public house. C16, with C18 and early-C19 alterations.
MATERIALS: timber-frame structure, refronted in brick with stone details, stuccoed. Slate roofs and a brick stack. Timber sash windows. Later red brick range to rear.
PLAN: front block with long rear wing.
EXTERIOR: the building is of three storeys, with a cellar, with a hipped roof with a central stack. The principal elevation is four bays wide, composed of a stone plinth, raised and chamfered stone quoins at each corner, stone string courses at the first and second-floor sill levels, a crowning cornice with close-set modillions and a stone-coped parapet. Across the front above the windows on the first floor there is a shallow, framed panel (apparently covering ‘LOWER GEORGE HOTEL’ in raised letters), and on the ground floor above the windows a similar panel which holds the building’s sign.
On the ground floor, to the right there is a doorway with a rectangular fanlight in an opening framed by a moulded and eared stone architrave with a raised keystone in the head. To the left, there are two six-over-six paned sash windows with horns, and further left a wider eight-over-eight pane sash, all in openings with shouldered and eared architraves, keystones in the heads, and projecting stone sills on moulded end-brackets. Each of the upper floors have four windows irregularly spaced in two pairs; all are of a similar size comprising six-over-six panes without horns and in openings with shouldered and eared architraves and raised keystones in the heads. On the first floor, in the centre between the windows, there is a smaller panel similar to the panels above the first and ground-floor windows.
INTERIOR: the ground floor is understood to have been altered in the C20, including its bar fittings. On the upper floors and in the roof exposed timber-framing is understood to survive. The cellar may also retain fabric from the C16 merchant’s house.
