Summary
A townhouse with rear wool warehouse, of 1760 for William Chippendale, converted as newspaper premises in 1874 and now shop and offices, in Classical style of buff sandstone with slate roofs.
Reasons for Designation
38 High Street, Skipton, a townhouse with rear wool warehouse, of 1760, converted as newspaper premises in 1874, and now shop and offices, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
Architectural interest:
* as a good example of late-C18 combined domestic and commercial premises, which survive well externally and retain some internal features of interest;
* enhanced by late-C19 and early-C20 commercial adaptations, most notably the shopfront and floor mosaics.
History
38 High Street was built in 1760 for wool merchant William Chippendale. The rear range was originally a warehouse, directly accessible via the ginnel, with its security gate.
In 1834 John Tasker, a printer, bookseller and stationer from Huddersfield lived here, having moved premises from Sheep Street. Tasker’s shop is depicted in a print of around 1840, with small-paned bow windows flanking the entrance. In January 1853 he began producing the Craven Herald as a monthly scientific and literary journal, but gave up production in 1858 to be the town’s postmaster.
In 1874 the Craven Herald was resurrected as a weekly newspaper by the town’s Conservative supporters, who bought the premises here from John’s son, James Tasker. The company’s name was quickly changed from the Craven Conservative Newspaper Company to the Skipton Stationery Company. The premises are shown in a late-C19 advertisement and a photograph dating from after the library was built, with a different shopfront with a left-hand doorway and three panes to the right of this, indicating that the current shopfront is from 1910 or later.
In 1948 the company bought the premises in Hardcastle Yard to the south and west and enlarged the printing press into those premises in 1958. Number 38 was listed in 1978. Printing continued here until 15 April 1988, after the paper had been bought by Westminster Press. After this, the western end of Hardcastle’s Yard was developed for housing, as Bay Horse Court. The Herald still (2024) has a local office in the rear wing of number 38.
Details
A townhouse with rear wool warehouse, of 1760 for William Chippendale, converted as newspaper premises in 1874, now shop and offices.
MATERIALS: buff sandstone, slate roofs, red brick western part of rear wing.
PLAN: a three-storey domestic front range to the west side of the High Street, with a long rear commercial wing in two phases, also of three storeys. A flat-roofed extension bridges the ginnel in the angle between the front range and rear wing, partially obscuring the façade of the latter.
EXTERIOR: the front façade faces east and is in squared rubble in diminishing courses, framed by ashlar giant pilasters and a heavy moulded cornice, and with a plain projecting band between the first and second floors. The ground floor is framed by timber shopfront pilasters with consoles, linked by a timber fascia with cornice. At the left is a panelled entry to the ginnel accessing the rear yard (formerly Tasker’s Yard), with wrought-iron gate and grille. To the right is an early-C20 shopfront with ashlar stall riser and delicate glazing bars and colonnettes to the curved outer windows and recessed centre windows (all with arched transom lights), flanking the central glazed door. The entrance has a marble threshold and an Art Nouveau mosaic recording the ‘Skipton Stationery Co Ltd’, and the ginnel entry has a similar mosaic (without lettering). The upper floor windows all have moulded stone cases; three tall sashes to the first floor and two squarer sashes to the top floor (all horned, without glazing bars). The ridge has alternate cresting.
The south wall of the front range is abutted by a two-storey shop and is rendered above this, with stone coping, prominent moulded kneelers and corniced ridge stack. The north wall is obscured by the adjoining 34 and 36 High Street (National Heritage List for England entry 1131879).
The three-storey rear wing has blind stone north walls, partially abutted by adjacent buildings, with quoins defining a phase break.
The front (south) wall of this wing is also quoined at the phase break. The eastern section is in rubble walling. At the east end of this is a partially blocked round-arched doorway, now overhung by a first-and-second-floor rear extension to the front range. Left of this is a tall, stepped stair window formed by a low light linking an un-horned ground-floor sash window with a pair of horned sash windows offset to the left at the first floor (the second floor has similar paired windows above). Further west is another un-horned ground-floor window, and an altered entrance with three overlights. Above this are stacked, paired sash windows with horns. To the west of it is a smaller blocked doorway. All the openings have stone surrounds.
The western section is in red brick (painted at the ground floor), with four replacement windows to each floor, those on the upper floors in openings with stone sills and lintels. The west gable of this section has a second-floor window. The wall below this is obscured by the abutting two-storey stone building to the west.
INTERIOR: the upper floors of the front range have inserted dry linings and suspended ceilings but retain a roof structure of hewn timbers, and a re-set C18 white marble fireplace to the first floor, with reeded pilasters and frieze, and red-marble panel and roundels. The rear range has an inserted modern steel staircase.
