Summary
Pair of houses constructed during the mid-to late-C18, extended to the rear (west) during the C19. The ground floor was combined into a single retail unit by the late-C19 or early-C20, with the upper floors converted to flats.
History
The town of Leominster traces its origins to the establishment of a religious house there during the C7 or earlier. The Saxon settlement endured repeated Viking raids and is recorded as a sizeable town in the Domesday Book (1086), with 27 households. In the early C12, King Henry I established a Benedictine Priory in the town and granted a foundation charter for the town’s market. The town thrived throughout the later medieval period, despite periodic unrest due to its location in the border region. Leominster wool was prized across Europe and bestowed considerable wealth upon the town. The town centre retains many medieval and early-modern buildings; secular buildings are timber framed while surviving Priory buildings are constructed of local sandstone. The town centre retains an essentially medieval street pattern, with long, narrow burgage plots fronting the north-south spine road of Broad Street-High Street-South Street, and Corn Square (the historic market place) lying to the east of the High Street. The remains of the Priory, dissolved in 1539, lie to the north-east of the town centre. The town remained a prominent local centre into the C18 and C19. During this period, many timber-framed buildings replaced (or refronted) by brick buildings with Classical elevations. Many houses in the town centre were partially converted to commercial use and equipped with shopfronts during the later-C19 and C20.
21 Broad Street was constructed during the mid to late-C18, probably on the site of an earlier building. Originally built as a pair of houses, the ground floor was later combined as a single unit and by the mid-C20 the building was operating as The Blue Boar Public House. The ground floor shop window and fascia board would suggest the conversion had occurred by the late-C19 or early-C20. The building had been extended to the rear (west) along New Street by 1885. The greater part of this rear extension appears to survive much-altered today as a two-storey, pitch-roofed element. The principal building was refurbished sometime between 2009 and 2016, with a new roof covering and the renewal of two dormer windows in the rear (west) elevation including the removal of a timber pediment over one of them. The building is currently (2022) in use as a takeaway on the ground floor, with the upper floors converted to flats.
Details
Pair of houses constructed during the mid to late-C18, extended to the rear (west) during the C19. The ground floor was combined into a single retail unit by the late-C19 or early-C20, with the upper floors converted to flats.
MATERIALS: the building is rendered externally, with smooth render to the ground floor of the principal (east) and north elevations and the rear (west) elevation of the principal range, and roughcast to the upper floors of the east and north elevations. The later, rear extension is of red brick with a timber-framed side return. The roof covering is modern artificial slate.
PLAN: the building occupies a rectangular plan, with the principal elevation onto Broad Street to the east and later extensions to the west.
EXTERIOR: the principal, C18 range to the east is of three storeys across two bays under a pitched roof. The principal, east elevation is symmetrically arranged. On the ground floor are a matching pair of entrances with uPVC doors under blocked fanlights, set within timber doorcases with moulded, open-pediment hoods on fluted consoles and panelled pilasters. Between the two doors is a late-C19 or early-C20 window with leaded clerestory casements within a moulded stucco architrave. Above the doors is a simple fascia board terminating in simple console brackets. The first, second and third floors each contain two timber sash windows set within moulded surrounds set flush with the façade, with stone or stucco cills. The first-floor windows have three-over-six glazing, the second-floor windows have six-over-six glazing and the third-floor windows have three-over-three glazing. Above the third-floor windows, the roof pitch projects out to form a deep eaves.
The north elevation onto New Street is blank aside from a very small window on the ground floor, set within the infilled area of a larger window, of which the cill remains. Above the window is a moulded string course at ground-floor ceiling height. The rear (west) elevation of the principal range contains a single, timber casement window on the first floor and a single, uPVC casement on the second floor. There are two, flat-roofed dormers containing casement windows on the western roof slope, and a C20, axial brick stack rising through the western roof slope. A C19, two-storey, pitch-roofed range extends to the west of the principal, east range. There is a uPVC casement window and brick scarring on its west elevation.
