Post Office
POST OFFICE, MARKET PLACE
Listed on the National Heritage List for England. Search over 400,000 listed places
Overview
- Heritage Category:
- Listed Building
- Grade:
- II
- List Entry Number:
- 1383025
- Date first listed:
- 31-Jul-1970
- List Entry Name:
- Post Office
- Statutory Address:
- POST OFFICE, MARKET PLACE
Location
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Images of England Project
- Date:
- 2001-04-23
- Reference:
- IOE01/03211/21
- Rights:
- © John Boothroyd. Source: Historic England Archive
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Discover moreOfficial list entry
- Heritage Category:
- Listed Building
- Grade:
- II
- List Entry Number:
- 1383025
- Date first listed:
- 31-Jul-1970
- List Entry Name:
- Post Office
- Statutory Address 1:
- POST OFFICE, MARKET PLACE
The scope of legal protection for listed buildings
This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.
Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.
For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.
The scope of legal protection for listed buildings
This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.
Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.
For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.
Location
- Statutory Address:
- POST OFFICE, MARKET PLACE
The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.
- District:
- Somerset (Unitary Authority)
- Parish:
- Wells
- National Grid Reference:
- ST 55067 45754
Details
WELLS
ST5445 MARKET PLACE
662-1/7/162 (East side)
31/07/70 Post Office
GV II
Former market house, now Post Office. 1835, by R Carver.
Doulting stone ashlar, hipped Welsh slate roof to centre
porch, flat roof to sides, ashlar chimney stack.
EXTERIOR: one-and-half storey central section of 5 bays, with
2 set-back single-storey four-bay wings, each end bay further
recessed. In a strict classical form. Plinth, Tuscan pilasters
to ends and corners, and attached Tuscan columns between bays
and doubling with pilaster to outer bays of central section;
full frieze with metopes, cornice, and pediments to outer bays
of centre portion, plain parapets.
Semicircular arched openings to all bays, with side impost,
architraves and keystones, keystones, the openings now filled
with plain windows except extreme left bay, with a 6-panel
door, bay 5 of central portion with a pair of doors, bay 2 of
right wing a pair of doors, and the extreme right bay has
carriage doors, part glazed. The upper storey has 3 slim
semicircular arched window to the 3 middle bays, with matching
panels over bays 1 and 5 above the pediments, plain parapet.
The rear elevation is rendered, and extremely plain by
contrast; the central hipped roof section has glazing at the
ridge, and lean-tos at each side run down to long flat-roofed
wings. The centre block has 9 small arched slit-lights above
1+3 square lights at the lower level, and to each side are
1:3:1 two and 3-light casements. All these windows are barred
externally.
INTERIOR: has not retained any features of interest to ground
floor.
HISTORICAL NOTE: in a photograph of 1902 the building is shown
with the arcade still not enclosed; they were filled with
panels and windows in the following year.
(Buildings of England: Pevsner N: North Somerset and Bristol:
London: 1958-: 325; Blue Guide: Orbach J: Victorian
Architecture in Britain: London: 1987-: 378; Howell C: Wells
in Old Photographs: Gloucester: 1989-: 36).
Listing NGR: ST5506545761
Legacy
The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.
- Legacy System number:
- 483443
- Legacy System:
- LBS
Sources
Books and journals
Pevsner, N, The Buildings of England: North Somerset and Bristol, (1958), 325
Howell, C, Wells in Old Photographs, (1989), 36
Orbach, J, Blue Guide to Victorian Architecture in Britain, (1987), 378
Legal
This building is listed under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 as amended for its special architectural or historic interest.
Map
This map is for quick reference purposes only and may not be to scale. This copy shows the entry on 22-Jun-2026 at 09:29:00.
Download a full scale map (PDF)End of official list entry
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