Webber House

Details

TEWKESBURY

SO83SE GLOUCESTER ROAD 859-1/2/180 (North East side) 14/02/85 Webber House (Formerly Listed as: GLOUCESTER ROAD (North East side) The Holm Hospital)

GV II

Retirement apartments, formerly House of Industry and Union Workhouse. Built by Act of Parliament 1792-6, possibly to designs of George Byfield, a designer of gaols; later a hospital, now (1991) apartments. English bond brickwork, slate roofs, brick stacks. PLAN: a symmetrical composition with large square central block with short one-bay links to narrow cross wings; the site falls away at the back to reveal the basement level. Windows generally are replacement tripartite plain pseudo-sashes under brick voussoirs, and on flush bullnose brick cills. EXTERIOR: centre block is 3 storeys and basement, in 5 bays with windows in reducing proportions, and with approx 1.5m of plain brickwork above the second floor lights, all under a low-pitched hipped roof. Centre is a large late C20 steel and glass porch on a ramp and 3 steps. Inner door under plain square opening. Set forward by a half-brick depth the link units in 2 storeys have sashes set in a sunk arched panel; a third storey, rendered, with one sash, has been added, and is slightly set back from the brick parapet. The wings are set forward, with a sash at ground and first floors on the returns, to a narrow one-bay gabled end containing a lunette. Each wing has 2 large plain stacks at the inner eaves. The whole building is on a moulded brick plinth, and the centre block has a brick dentil eaves. Right return is in 5 bays, the centre one having a set-back full-height arched panel. 5 bays; C19 hipped dormers with 2-light casements over 2 floors of sashes, but central C20 wide glazed door unit with pediment, on flight of brick steps to concrete bridge. The NE front, facing the Abbey (qv), is similar to the street front, but with an extra storey in the basement plinth, which also has a central glazed door. The left wing is similar to the right one. The INTERIOR, which was very plain, has now been modified by the insertion of partitions to provide multiple apartments. This was a relatively rare example of a pre-Poor Law Amendment Act Workhouse, and it became the Tewkesbury Union Workhouse in 1835. The late C20 alterations have removed a number of intrusive elements, and the street frontage, recorded in 1985 as painted, has been stripped back to the brickwork. The glazed entrance replaces a former flat concrete hood of the 1950s. A somewhat austere, but complete and balanced design occupying an important site in the approach to the town from the S, and in views from the Abbey.

Listing NGR: SO8891432092

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:

376761

Legacy System:

LBS

Sources

Other
Battlefields Register,

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