Summary
A pair of properties constructed early or mid-C18, possibly originally built for commercial use on the ground floor with domestic accommodation above, in 2022 remaining as two retail shops with accommodation above.
Reasons for Designation
101 and 103 Westgate, with a separate flat to the first floor above (Flat 5 to rear of 97 Westgate), is listed for the following principal reasons:
Architectural interest:
* as a good example of modest early-mid C18 vernacular construction before the move to more fashionable and architecturally polite townhouses of the early C19.
Historic interest:
* the pedestrian passageway, originally giving access to Schofield’s yard to the rear, illustrates the evolution of towns and cities like Wakefield where medieval burgage plots were developed with domestic, commercial and industrial premises extending to the rear.
History
Wakefield, established in the medieval period on the river Calder as a trading centre, had developed into the capital of Yorkshire's cloth trade by the C14. Westgate was one of its four principal streets, with long and narrow burgage plots extending back from the street frontage, mainly owned by craftsmen and traders with commercial properties facing the street with workshops to the rear. During the C17 and C18, Westgate became a popular residential district for wool chapmen and others from the mercantile classes, seeing townhouses erected on the street frontages. In the C19 this gentrification started to reverse, with wealthy residents moving elsewhere, this accelerating with the arrival of the railway in 1857. In the later C19 Westgate gained several grand Victorian buildings. The development of Upper Westgate continued through the C20 with the growth of retail premises, both in purpose-built structures and in the conversion of existing townhouses, whilst this part of Westgate saw the extensive clearance of buildings extending along the rear of the burgage plots.
The pair of properties, 101 and 103 Westgate, were built in the early or mid-C18. They are shown on the 1790s Enclosure map when they were owned by Thomas Lumb who also owned 105 Westgate. Lumb insured his property (recorded as brick-built and slated) in 1792 with the Sun Insurance Company which records the tenants as being John Wood (hairdresser) and John Pickering (bricklayer), the properties insured for £60 and £50. They do not appear to have been built as townhouses but are thought to have been, as they remain in 2022, ground-floor commercial premises with first-floor domestic accommodation. Census records and other documentary sources record a series of different occupiers. Until renumbering in the 1880s, 101 was numbered 116 and 103 was 118, also known as Dunstable House in the mid-C19. Behind these surviving street frontage buildings were originally further buildings of Schofield’s Yard, infilling the former medieval burgage plot. However, these rear buildings (cottages and other premises) were demolished sometime between the surveys of the 1933 and 1954 1:2500 Ordnance Survey maps.
Numbers 101 and 103 Westgate demonstrate that although Westgate was a popular residential street for wealthy merchants in the C18, this did not completely displace more commercial use and lower status, above-the-shop housing; a land-use pattern that can trace its origins back to the medieval development of Wakefield.
Details
Pair of shops with domestic accommodation above, early to mid-C18 with later alterations.
MATERIALS: variably coloured handmade brick mainly laid in English garden wall bond, stone sills, replacement Welsh slate roof.
PLAN: two ground-floor shops flanking an open passageway through the building that provides access to the rear yard. Domestic accommodation above. The property to the right (west, number 103) has a truncated rear wing.
EXTERIOR:
Westgate elevation: this is of four bays and two storeys with shopfronts flanking a round-arched pedestrian passageway leading to Schofield's Yard to the rear; the passage being below the western first-floor window of number 101. The shopfronts are late Victorian or Edwardian style but with relatively simple replaced joinery. The shop doors are six-panelled. The first-floor windows have stone sills and replaced sash windows; the two to number 101 being below segmental arches of brick headers, and those to 103 with flat lintels. The front elevation of number 103 is stepped back slightly, the eaves having a brick modillion cornice to maintain the roofline with number 101.
Rear elevation: retains one bay of the gabled, rearward projecting range behind number 103 Westgate; this being of two storeys but lower than the main building. Just above its ridgeline, a large square brick stack rises from the rear roof slope of 103 Westgate.
