Details
This list entry was subject to a Minor Enhancement on 17 September 2024 to amend the name address and description, add references to selected sources and to reformat the text to current standards.
SJ4066SE
595-1/4/42
CHESTER CITY (IM)
BRIDGE STREET
Nos 22, 24 and 26 , The Dutch Houses and BRIDGE STREET ROW WEST Nos 20, 22 and 24
(Formerly listed as BRIDGE STREET AND ROW Nos.22, 24 & 26 Street and Nos.20, 22 & 24 Row (The Dutch Houses), previously listed as: BRIDGE STREET Nos 22 to 26 (even) Street & Nos 20 to 24 (even) Row)
28/07/55
GV
II
Number 22-26 Bridge Street and 20-24 Bridge Street Row West comprise a former townhouse with a Row and undercroft which may have been built in the late C17 as a single dwelling and later subdivided. Although there is thought to be no surviving above-ground historic fabric earlier than the C17, the building is likely to have replaced earlier structures on the site. The building incorporates sandstone piers which rise through all four storeys, which architectural historian J T Smith previously suggested may be of medieval origin. However, later work, including evidence from a 1970s rebuild, suggests that this is not likely. The building was altered in the C18 and C19 and from the mid-C19 to early C20 the undercroft shops had a range of relatively upmarket occupants, which reflected the increased prosperity and rateable value of property in this part of Bridge Street by the turn of the C20. Following a 1968 survey of the Chester Rows, Chester City Council embarked on a renewal scheme which involved the purchase of the property from four separate owners and extensive, heavy restoration. The work, carried out between 1973-75, involved a complete rebuild of the façade and the replacement of much of the historic timber frame with structural steel, although some internal features from the late-C17 townhouse survive. Modern shopfronts were also inserted to the Row level. The building now has three separate shop units at street level and is mutually overlapping at Row level and above. It is constructed of sandstone, late-C17 timber framing, late-C17 or C18 brickwork with render, and a grey slate roof. Heavy restoration in 1973-1975 destroyed elements of the old building and inserted concrete and steel framing.
EXTERIOR: the building is of four storeys, including the former undercroft and Row levels, plus an attic storey. At undercroft level, 22 and 26 Bridge Street have modern shopfronts. The shopfront to number 24 has a recessed door and a large window above a pair of panels. The painted frame of the shopfront is probably of cast-iron and has slim colonnettes with foliar capitals and quadrant mouldings in the upper corners of the panes.
At Row level, the Row front has substantial wooden painted barley-sugar balusters and rails, those to number 20 were inserted in 1973 in place of a C19 cast-iron railing. There is a rectangular stop-chamfered sandstone pier at each end and between number 20 and 22. A thinner octagonal pillar is between number 22 and 24. There are sockets, now filled, for a former rail at the rear of the sloping stallboard. The Row walkway paving is covered and there are replaced beams and a plaster ceiling over the stallboard and Row walkway. The Row has two modern shopfronts. The frontage of the third, fourth and attic storeys has been renewed and has had numerous alterations. There is a renewed oak fascia over the Row front on brackets and four painted wooden barley-sugar pilasters with quasi-Ionic capitals, renewed at least in part, to each of the third and fourth storeys. All of the windows have been renewed to a different style: those above 20 and 22 Bridge Street Row were previously sash windows. The third storey has two mullioned and transomed three-light leaded casement windows with top-hung top-lights to 20 Bridge Street Row. There is a similar five-light casement to number 22 and a four-light casement to the front of number 24, plus a transomed single-light casement to its south return. At the fourth storey floor level there is a replaced oak architrave, frieze and cornice, above which is a mullioned six-light leaded casement window to 20 Bridge Street Row with alternating top-hung top-lights. There is a four-light mullioned and transomed leaded casement to number 22, and one of six lights to number 24. A single-light transomed casement window is in the south return. In front of the attic storey is a replaced oak cornice and lead apron roof which has three mullioned and transomed leaded casement windows with top-hung top-lights. There are plain bargeboards to the three front gables.
The rear of the building has two gables, one to the north bay (above 20 Bridge Street Row) and one to the combined middle and south bays (above 22 and 24 Bridge Street Row). This arrangement, and the octagonal pillar near the front of the junction line at the front of the building, suggest that 22 and 24 Bridge Street Row may have been a single tenement, possibly from the Middle Ages. What can be seen of number 20 appears to be late-C17 in date but has been rendered and has a C19 window. 22 and 24 are C18, in Flemish bond with projecting bands and nine-pane, 12-pane and 16-pane sash windows.
INTERIOR: most of the features at the street and Row levels are covered, except for some C17 ceiling joists which are visible in 24 Bridge Street, a C19 stair and some C17 timbers in 22 Bridge Street Row and C17 joists in 24 Bridge Street Row.
Features in the upper storeys (disconnected) are largely of individual interest. The third storey has a mid-C17 fireplace in the north wall of the front parlour, a chamfered stone pier in the north and south wall and some probable C18 or C19 brickwork. The parlour extending across the fronts of 22 and 24 Bridge Street Row shows the south side of the south pier in number 20 and a chamfered pier in the south wall of number 24. The column between 22 and 24, immediately above the similar column in the Row, suggests that the chamber always encompassed two bays. The ceiling above the bay of number 24 has a good three-panel moulded plaster ceiling of around 1700 which was removed, restored and re-installed in 1975. There is a late-C17 fireplace in the south wall, and in the south wall of the rear room of number 24, which also has C17 oak beams.
The fourth storey has sandstone piers and an octagonal column. As in the third storey, there is a C17 sandstone fireplace in the south wall of 24 Bridge Street Row. An altered oak newel stair with two barley-sugar balusters per step rises from the third storey to the attic. The attic storey, which is largely clad, has a late-C17 roof truss at the rear of the front room above 20 Bridge Street Row and oak purlins at the rear of number 22 and 24.
The restoration of 1973-5 is of some interest as an example of the methods which were then used on a severely dilapidated building.
Listing NGR: SJ4051966212
